Norway’s government wants to get a handle on both the promise and peril of AI glasses and is proposing that parliament enact a temporary ban on them in some places.
Privacy
Automatic Transmission â a data-privacy study of connected vehicles
We found that vehicles, under a variety of real-world settings, contact not only a wide range of first parties (i.e., manufacturer domains) and car-specific support parties, but also third parties that are known to provide advertising and tracking services. Our study revealed a large gap between what vehicle manufacturers publicly disclosed and how the connected vehicle ecosystem actually shares data over the Internet
Library’s Viral ‘Bye, Bye AI’ Event Will Take AI Off Your Phone – Business Insider
The poster was made by the library's sole full-time librarian, Shea Wert. Wert told Business Insider that she had made this event in response to community demand — and was surprised by the reaction from far-flung places.
Navigating State Consumer Privacy Laws and Compliance Challenges
Are You Ready for The Latest U.S. State Consumer Privacy Laws?
Nineteen states have followed the lead of California and passed consumer privacy laws. Three went into effect this year and eight will become effective in 2025. The remainder become effective in 2026. Charts at the end of this post track effective dates (see Table 1) and applicability thresholds (see Table 2). While there are many similar aspects to these laws, they also diverge from each other in material ways, creating a compliance challenge for organizations. In addition, there are other privacy laws pertaining specifically to consumer health data,[1] laws specific to children’s and minors’ personal data and not part of a comprehensive consumer privacy law,[2] AI-specific laws,[3] or laws, including part of overall consumer privacy laws, regulating data brokers[4] that enterprises need to consider.
An investigation exposes data brokers using ads to help track almost any phone
Locate X uses a phone%u2019s mobile advertising ID to create a vast network of device locations
An investigation conducted by a data privacy group has revealed a vast tracking network that can follow the movements of a person’s phone, according to reports from 404 Media and Krebs on Security. The people-tracking service, called Locate X, reportedly lets users follow a device using its mobile advertising identifier, a unique number assigned to phones.
Meta smart glasses can be used to dox anyone in seconds, study finds
Meta smart glasses can be used to dox anyone in seconds, study finds
Opt out of PimEyes now, students warn
For Nguyen and Ardayfio, the point of the project was to persuade people to opt out of invasive search engines to protect their privacy online. An attempt to use I-XRAY to identify 404 Media reporter Joseph Cox, for example, didn’t work because he’d opted out of PimEyes.But while privacy is clearly important to the students and their demo video strove to remove identifying information, at least one test subject was “easily” identified anyway, 404 Media reported. That test subject couldn’t be reached for comment, 404 Media reported.
Why a ruling against the Internet Archive threatens the future of America’s libraries
Why a ruling against the Internet Archive threatens the future of America%u2019s librariesThe decision locks libraries into an ecosystem that is not in readers; interests. Congress must act.
This decision harms libraries. It locks them into an e-book ecosystem designed to extract as much money as possible while harvesting (and reselling) reader data en masse. It leaves local communities’ reading habits at the mercy of curatorial decisions made by four dominant publishing companies thousands of miles away. It steers Americans away from one of the few remaining bastions of privacy protection and funnels them into a surveillance ecosystem that, like Big Tech, becomes more dangerous with each passing data breach. And by increasing the price for access to knowledge, it puts up even more barriers between underserved communities and the American dream.
Ten Stories That Shaped 2022
It’s again time (for the 20th time!) for a look back at the notable library stories from the last year.
The Good
10. Lizzo at LOC
In September, Lizzo toured the Library of Congress, stopping to play a crystal flute that once belonged to James Madison.
9. New Federal Open Access Memo
In August, another federal policy guideline was released encouraging publishers "to make the results of taxpayer-supported research immediately available to the American public at no cost."
8. More Institutions End Late Fees
Libraries continue to drop the policy of assessing late fees for books returned past their due date.
7. Controlled Digital Lending Gains Support
News flash: libraries are allowed to lend books. And there is no legal provision restricting the format for doing so. Controlled Digital Lending makes use of this, although the practice faces challenges.
The Bad
6. WorldCat Monopoly Continues
After making waves by announcing a new, free shared catalog service called "MetaDoor," Clarivate responded to a lawsuit against the plan from OCLC by shuttering the project.
5. Theft of Presidential Documents
Unless you were hiding under a rock this year, you heard the story of a certain former President making off with confidential records.
4. Library Vendors and Surveillance Capitalism
The practices of several companies in the library industry also profiting from the monetization of personal data have made for an uneasy mix with privacy advocates.
The Ugly
3. E-Book Licensing Hits Snags
Multiple efforts to curtail publisher moves at making more restrictive electronic book agreements, including in Connecticut, Maryland, and New York, resulted in limited success.
2. Labor Disputes Aplenty
As documented in multiple reports and studies, library workers are enduring many hostilities in their working environments. It’s little wonder, then, that many worker movements happened in response this year, including in Illinois, Texas, and Washington.
1. Book Bannings Continue
The ongoing and very widespread challenges to library materials is again this year’s top story. How has your library been impacted?
Ten Stories That Shaped 2019
As we limp headfirst into a new decade, it’s beginning to feel like many of these stories have become perennial entries.
2019 saw yet more drag queen story hour protests, vendor buyouts, the persistence of fake news, scandals, and lawsuits aplenty, along with the usual spate of book burning and banning.
Below are some of the other notable headlines from the past year’s library-related news.
10. Naomi Cries Wolf
Feminist author Naomi Wolf found her book Outrages: Sex, Censorship, and the Criminalization of Love cancelled by the publisher after a public revelation that its research was based on the flawed assumption of equating "death recorded" with the death penalty.
9. Circulating More than Books
For years, libraries have been experimenting with checking out tools, humans, and other non-book items—a practice which continues to make headlines.
8. Clueless Architects
More proof that money doesn’t always buy common sense: A new $41 million branch of the Queens Public Library (initially) placed books on a staircase, rendering then inaccessible to wheelchairs, while Cornell University’s new upskirt-friendly building came with a $21.6 million price tag.
7. Emma Boettcher Wins Big!
Allowing ourselves to take a break from railing against "vocational awe" in librarianship, we offered a collective kudos this year to librarian Emma Boettcher for her appearances on the Jeopardy! game show.
6. The New York Times Flap
Calling it "fake news," a Florida commission blocked libraries from licensing The New York Times, while another patron in Idaho garnered national attention for their attempts to censor anti-Trump titles.
5. Privacy Roundup
Privacy issues this year included the boycott of the new registration policy from LinkedIn Learning; concerns over FaceApp and facial recognition software; complications with DNA Testing; and the legal case over the 2020 census citizenship question.
4. I’m Ok, You’re Biased
The concept of "algorithmic bias" is nothing new, but this year more attention was focused on how prevalent it has become in library systems.
3. "Cancel Culture" Hits Libraries
Examples include the removal of Mevil Dewey’s name on a library award as well as the cancellation of multiple conference sessions. Other cases where a controversial speaker was not cancelled involved the Toronto Public Library and the Seattle Public Library.
2. Publisher Pushbacks
The biggest open access story of the year would have to be the University of California’s failed negotiations with Elsevier. Other notable events include the New York Public Library’s cancellation of their Kanopy subscription, outrage over new e-book terms from Macmillian and Pearson, and the slow advancement of Plan S.
1. Whither Late Fees?
The movement to end library late fees seemed to reach the start of a tipping point this year. Whether or not your library continues this practice, it should at least justify the current policy in place.
What was your favorite library story of the past year? Mine was the debate over whether or not a character in Good Omens would actually wear white gloves when handling old books.
Ten Stories That Shaped 2018
As we limp our way into 2019, let’s take a look back at some of the notable library stories from the past year.
10. The Opioid Epidemic Continues
The abuse of narcotics has become so widespread in this country that our average life expectancy has declined as a result. The use of Narcan to treat overdoses occurring in libraries is one way we can contribute to public health.
9. More Fake News
Although political propaganda is nothing new, the growing threat of what has been dubbed “information terrorism,” aided by technological advances in the creation of bogus pieces of reporting, make our role as archivists and educators all the more important.
8. Search Engines are Bigots
The popular book Algorithms of Oppression brought to light something that librarians have long known: “Garbage In, Garbage Out” applies when it comes to aggregating information. Here’s hoping that future generations of AI can unlearn the prejudices of the past.
7. Prison Book Bannings
The majority of Republicans think that higher education is bad for the country. So it’s little wonder that efforts to provide for a literate prison populace have met stiff resistance by those in charge of the prison–industrial complex.
6. Judicial Issues Roundup
Legal cases making headlines in 2018 include: the right to repair; abandonware and Fair Use; the GSU e-reserves case; the Marakesh Treaty; Ebsco and pornography; 3D printing of guns; and moving the Copyright Office out of the Library of Congress.
Honorable Mention
Kudos to John Oliver for donating all proceeds to The Trevor Project and AIDS United from the sales of his bunny book, A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo.
5. A New “Fake Paper” Scandal
There was a split verdict this year over the success of an elaborate sting to publish hoaxes and other dubious scholarship in peer-reviewed humanities journals.
4. Whither Open Access
A proposed European policy that would eventually require journals to make published articles freely available and without an embargo, known as “Plan S,” has won over many Open Access advocates, although not everyone is totally on board with the idea.
3. Eschewing Fines
Several libraries made the news this year by eliminating fees for overdue books.
2. Data Breaches Fuel Privacy Concerns
The Cambridge Analytica scandal and similar exploits have led librarians to carefully examine their own data collection practices. Be on the lookout for a gradual erosion of patron privacy through new tracking mechanisms on the horizon.
1. LGBT Challenges & Drag Queen Story Hours
Amidst the backdrop of a Utah library director banning LGBTQ-themed displays and an Iowa man burning LGBTQ library books, libraries in Louisiana, Kansas, and Texas faced strong criticism for planning childrens’ programs with drag queens, prompting a reasoned blog post titled, “Appeasement Doesn’t Work.”
What was your favorite library story of 2018?
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