It’s not unusual for businesses to spend princely sums lobbying government to free them from regulations, which generally means consumer protections are reduced or eliminated. In a nutshell, that’s much of what goes on in the halls of government, as we’ve previously reported.
But it is a bit more unconventional when a self-described coalition of nonprofit organizations promotes the same agenda as large telecom companies, putting consumers at the short end of the stick.
Protesters blocked the entrance to Silicon Valley tech company Palantir’s cafeteria on Friday, denouncing its work aiding the US government’s immigration crackdown and urging employees to speak out.
About 70 protesters swarmed Palantir’s Palo Alto, Calif. headquarters in the early afternoon, bearing signs criticizing the company for doing business with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency and chanting slogans.
“Immigrants are welcome here, time to cancel Palantir,” the protesters shouted. “Dirty data company, drop ICE contracts, that’s our plea,” they sang.
SACRAMENTO — Soon after lawmakers returned to the Capitol this week, a slate of Privacy Act bills originally set to be heard by the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee instead went straight to the Senate floor, closing off a well-worn backchannel for end-of-session deal-making.
30 minute discussion with the Oscar Grant Committee on police killings in Contra Costa County, the Bay Area County with the highest level of law enforcement use of force against people of color. The committee recently met with new “progressive” DA Diana Becton to discuss the Terry Ammons death in Pittsburg and discovered the new DA is a lot like the old DA. With Gerald Smith and Michael Goldstein of the Oscar Grant Committee Against State Repression and MA ED Tracy Rosenberg
SACRAMENTO — As a consumer, Dirk Lorenz says he understands the anxiety many people feel about online ads that seem to stalk their search and social media visits. He, too, finds the mass collection of personal data invasive.
Oakland, California just became the third U.S. city to ban the use of facial recognition in public spaces.
A city ordinance passed Tuesday night which prohibits the city of Oakland from “acquiring, obtaining, retaining, requesting, or accessing” facial recognition technology, which it defines as “an automated or semi-automated process that assists in identifying or verifying an individual based on an individual’s face.”
Sports enthusiasts heading to Tokyo for the 2020 Summer Olympics beware: Japan intends to install hundreds of thousands of facial recognition cameras to identify everyone in attendance. The software, initially used when Tokyo hosted the Paralympic games in 2018, is meant to weed out, in real time, people suspected of being potential terrorists — and anyone with a criminal record or questionable immigration status.
