Immigration and ICE

2018 Contract Between Law Enforcement NLETS Database and ICE-ERO

by  •  • 0 Comments

A newly-released comprehensive list of ICE contracts from 2010-2018 released by Sludge has revealed a 2018 contract between the National Law Enforcement Telecommunications Agency (NLETS) and ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations. The contract document (dated September 21 2018 PR# 192118EROLESA 0053 is below.

The 2018 sole source contract is for $3.8 million over a five year period from 2018 to 2023. It’s purpose is to create a standardized list of crime codes. The contract states: “The work done under this contract will help ICE (and other state and national law enforcement agencies) conduct criminal history searches faster and with greater accuracy. This requirement directly supports the overall missions of ICE and ERO to identify, remove and arrest aliens who present a danger to national security, or are a risk to public safety, as well as those who enter the United States illegally or otherwise undermine the integrity of our immigration laws and our border control efforts.”

Read more →

Use of Force and Tasers

San Mateo County To Revise UOF Policies After Taser Deaths – Reportedly

by  •  • 0 Comments

On July 23, the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors announced coming changes to their Use of Force (UOF) policies, partially in response to three taser fatalities at the hands of San Mateo County sheriffs in a year, most notably the murder of Chinedu Okobi in October of 2018.

Press coverage: SF Gate: Sheriff Revisiting Use of Force Policy After Taser Death, NBC Bay Area: San Mateo County Changing Use of Force Policy, KPIX: San Mateo Sheriff Revising Use of Policy

Read more →

Facial Recognition

Oakland Passes Facial Recognition Ban

by  •  • 0 Comments

Following in San Francisco’s footsteps, the City of Oakland passed on first reading a modification of their Surveillance Transparency Ordinance that totally bans the use of facial recognition technology by the municipality. The municipal ban becomes the third in the nation, following San Francisco and Somerville, Massachusetts.

East Bay Times coverage

Vice coverage

CBS San Francisco coverage

Read more →

Data Privacy

Privacy Groups Preserve CA Consumer Privacy Act

by  •  • 0 Comments

The CA Legislature passed the California Consumer Privacy Act in a heated rush a year ago and just beat the clock for a planned statewide ballot initiative by a matter of hours. Consumer privacy advocates grumbled that the bill could be a bit better, industry groups promised to challenge it in 2019, and the one thing everyone agreed on was that some changes would happen. But on July 9th, the best efforts of the business lobby …. failed.

SF Chronicle: Fight to Change CA’s Landmark Privacy Law Fizzles

Read more →

Social Media

So You Never Wanted To Be A Porn Star?

by  •  • 0 Comments

by J.P. Massar

Well, now you may be, like it or not. Algorithms and processing have advanced to the point where your face may be substituted, digitally, seamlessly, and essentially undetectably (aka “deepfakes”), for that of a porn star, keeping said star’s body and the rest of film intact. 

While skilled forgers have plied their trade for millennia, and skilled special effects artists have been able to make us believe temporarily in dragons and light saber battles for decades, the time is soon coming where nothing visual or auditory, created or transmitted electronically, will be able to be trusted as representing reality.  

From cruel practical jokes where the voices of those you love are simulated, to officials apparently ordering plausible (or even absurd) actions they never actually issued, to photographic evidence and printed documents no longer having any standing legally, we face yet more consequences of our increasing reliance on ones and zeroes and the computers that manipulate them to define the state of our world. No longer will certain news organizations simply twist reality and fail to report what they don’t want to report, they will simply make reality up and present it as fact.

Not only are we quickly surrendering our privacy to the digital world, but we are about to surrender reality. And there may be no plausible remedy other than the fall of civilization. Happy belated 116th birthday, George O!

Social Media

Concerns About Facebook Currency

by  •  • 0 Comments

A coalition of privacy, civil rights and public interest groups sent a letter of concern about Facebook’s plan to introduce a digital currency.

The groups say Facebook’s new cryptocurrency raises “profound questions about national sovereignty, corporate power, consumer protection, competition policy, monetary policy, privacy and more.”

“The U.S. regulatory system is not prepared to address these questions. Nor are the regulatory systems of other nations or international institutions.”

More here: https://www.wnd.com/2019/07/coalition-calls-on-congress-to-torpedo-facebook-currency/