Cyber Security? That Is a Good Question
November 25, 2022
This is not ideal. We learn from Yahoo Finance, “Russian Software Disguised as American Finds Its Way into U.S. Army, CDC Apps.” Reuters journalists James Pearson and Marisa Taylor report:
“Thousands of smartphone applications in Apple and Google’s online stores contain computer code developed by a technology company, Pushwoosh, that presents itself as based in the United States, but is actually Russian, Reuters has found. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the United States’ main agency for fighting major health threats, said it had been deceived into believing Pushwoosh was based in the U.S. capital. After learning about its Russian roots from Reuters, it removed Pushwoosh software from seven public-facing apps, citing security concerns. The U.S. Army said it had removed an app containing Pushwoosh code in March because of the same concerns. That app was used by soldiers at one of the country’s main combat training bases. According to company documents publicly filed in Russia and reviewed by Reuters, Pushwoosh is headquartered in the Siberian town of Novosibirsk, where it is registered as a software company that also carries out data processing. … Pushwoosh is registered with the Russian government to pay taxes in Russia. On social media and in U.S. regulatory filings, however, it presents itself as a U.S. company, based at various times in California, Maryland and Washington, D.C., Reuters found.”
Pushwoosh’s software was included in the CDC’s main app and that share information on health concerns, including STDs. The Army had used the software in an information portal at, perhaps among other places, its National Training Center in California. Any data breach there could potentially reveal upcoming troop movements. Great. To be clear, there is no evidence data has been compromised. However, we do know Russia has a pesky habit of seizing any data it fancies from companies based within its borders.
Other entities apparently duped by Pushwoosh include the NRA, Britain’s Labor Party, large companies like Unilever, and makers of many items on Apple’s and Google’s app stores. The article includes details on how the company made it look like it was based in the US and states the FTC has the authority to prosecute those who engage in such deceptive practices. Whether it plans to bring charges is yet to be seen.
Cynthia Murrell, November 25, 2022
Are Governments Behaving Like Sheep?
November 24, 2022
North Korea, China, and possibly Russia are incarnates of Orwell’s Big Brother from the dystopian 1984 novel. The US government is compared to Big Brother (and rightly so) when it attempts to block free speech. The thing about outlawing free speech is that it takes too much energy to regulate. The US government wants to limit free speech, but only when it feels like it. We also do not want that, because the government lies. Gizmodo explains why we do not want the government to be Big Brother in: “You Really Don’t Want The Government To Be Your Content Moderator.”
The Department of Homeland Security is collaborating with tech firms and large businesses to repackage Bush’s “War on Terror” into a new product. They are building tools to monitor social media and combat disinformation. Why did this happen?
“In April, the Biden administration announced the launch of a Disinformation Governance Board, a new unit within DHS meant to “standardize the [government’s] treatment of disinformation” across various agencies. But the project was fumbled from the start: the unit initially failed to release a charter, leaving Americans to wonder just what exactly this shadowy new group with a creepy name was going to be doing. It didn’t take long for critics—on both the political left and right—to start referring to it as a “Ministry of Truth,” (the notorious propaganda bureau from George Orwell’s 1984). Though officials tried to salvage the effort. DHS shuttered the board in May after it had been operational for less than a month.”
Biden’s administration continued the Orwellian acts with a new organization: Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security (CISA). Big businesses such as JPMorgan Chase and Twitter are working with the FBI and CISA to approach state-sponsored disinformation campaigns. The US government also wants to address COVID-19 vaccine efficacy, US support of Ukraine, Afghanistan withdrawal, and racial justice.
Is the US government is not an impartial entity despite what politicians claim?
Whitney Grace, November 24, 2022
From Our Pipe Dream Department: Harmful AI Must Pay Victims!
October 28, 2022
It looks like the European Commission is taking the potential for algorithms to cause harm seriously. The Register reports, “Europe Just Might Make it Easier for People to Sue for Damage Caused by AI Tech.” Vice-president for values and transparency V?ra Jourová frames the measure as a way to foster trust in AI technologies. Apparently EU officials believe technical innovation is helped when the public knows appropriate guardrails are in place. What an interesting perspective. Writer Katyanna Quach describes:
“The proposed AI Liability Directive aims to do a few things. One main goal is updating product liability laws so that they effectively cover machine-learning systems and lower the burden-of-proof for a compensation claimant. This ought to make it easier for people to claim compensation, provided they can prove damage was done and that it’s likely a trained model was to blame. This means someone could, for instance, claim compensation if they believe they’ve been discriminated against by AI-powered recruitment software. The directive opens the door to claims for compensation following privacy blunders and damage caused by poor safety in the context of an AI system gone wrong. Another main aim is to give people the right to demand from organizations details of their use of artificial intelligence to aid compensation claims. That said, businesses can provide proof that no harm was done by an AI and can argue against giving away sensitive information, such as trade secrets. The directive is also supposed to give companies a clear understanding and guarantee of what the rules around AI liability are.”
Officials hope such clarity will encourage developers to move forward with AI technologies without the fear of being blindsided by unforeseen allegations. Another goal is to build the current patchwork of AI standards and legislation across Europe into a cohesive set of rules. Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders declares citizen protection top priority, stating, “technologies like drones or delivery services operated by AI can only work when consumers feel safe and protected.” Really? I’d like to see US officials tell that to Amazon.
Cynthia Murrell, October 28, 2022
Forty Firms and the European Union Demonstrate Their Failure to Be Googley
October 20, 2022
In the last 25 years, an estimated 300,000 people have worked for the Google as FTEs (full time equivalents). My view is that the current crop of European Union officials as well as the senior managers of several dozen online shopping services firms are not Google-grade human resources. Why do I make this distinction between those who are Googley and those who do not make the grade. Being Googley is not like the French Foreign Legion. In that organization, a wanna be Legionnaire must do push ups, master the lingo of the new homeland, and be ready to die for France. At Google one must be clever, have the “right stuff” intellectually, and be adept at solving problems, playing with a mobile phone, and manipulating a Mac simultaneously. Being Googley means understanding the ethos of the forever young online search system. That system, as I understand it, accepts the constraints of the GoTo, Overture, and Yahoo online advertising concept. Furthermore that system accepts that Oingo became a key component in matching advertising to user interests. Thus, to be Googley means that smart software, minimal interaction with humanoids who are by definition are “not Googley,” and reliance on charging for entering and leaving a digital saloon. Extra cash is required to enjoy the for fee options in the establishment; for example, a mouse pad with the Google logo silkscreened thereupon.
I read “EU Companies Claim Google Still Abusing its Shopping Power.” The article explains that a number of companies believe the Google is not behaving in a warm, friendly, collegial manner. Are these firms’ allegations correct?
I don’t know.
What I do know is that the companies signing the letter to EU regulators are demonstrating to me that these organizations are not Googley. What does this mean? May I hypothesize about the implications of lacking an understanding of the Alphabet Google YouTube DeepMind organization might be? Of course, you say. So here are my thoughts:
- None of the signatories nor the employees of these signatories will receive first-class tchotchkes at conferences at which AGYD has a booth or stand equipped with freebies
- None of the signatories, their employees, nor their progeny will be hired by AGYD due to manifest non Googliness. (Remember, please, that Googliness is next to Godliness. Who else can solve death?)
- None of the Web sites, online properties, or content objects will be made findable by the “black box” operated by closely guarded algorithms and informed by the superior methods of the smart software. (I must admit I find the idea “if you are findable in Google, you do not exist) a most existentially well formed idea.
- None of the elected officials involved in fining, criticizing, or demonstrating non Googliness will be supported in their re-election efforts by the GOOG’s powerful systems.
AGYD is not a company. It is a digital country. It handles more than 90 percent of the search queries in North America, South America, and Western Europe. YouTube is television for those in Eastern Europe. The Google is bigger than the definitely Google challenged in Europe. Perhaps thinking about the downsides of not being Googley is a useful activity? Just a thought. But it may be too late for the 40 outfits signing a letter attesting to their failure in the Google Comprehension Examination.
Stephen E Arnold, October 20, 2022
Why Is Google on the Hot Seat in India? Does the Indian Government Understand Being Googley?
October 19, 2022
The Competition Commission of India (CCI) is piling up allegations against Google faster than they can be resolved. The Indian Express reports, “CCI Orders Another Probe Against Google.” At issue is the company’s allegedly self-serving terms for news organizations. Gee, what do India’s regulators sense that US regulators seem to overlook? (And Europe‘s, for that matter.) We learn:
“The News Broadcasters & Digital Association had alleged that its members are forced to provide their news content to Google in order to prioritize their weblinks in the Search Engine Result Page (SERP) of Google. As a result, Google free rides on the content of the members without giving them adequate compensation, as per the complaint. Among others, it was alleged that Google exploited the dependency of the members on the search engine offered by Google for referral-traffic to build services such as Google News, Google Discover and Google Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP). The search engine major provides news content to user through Google Search and through news aggregator vertical, Google News. According to the complaint, in Google Search, users can either search directly for news through News Tab or receive news through result in SERPs. Google incorporated news content in its SERPs through featured snippets including ‘Top Stories’ carousels. However, the revenue distributed by Google to news publishers doesn’t compensate for the real contribution made by the association’s members to these platforms, it added.”
The latest probe is being consolidated with two similar ones already in progress. Those claimants are the Digital News Publishers Association and the Indian Newspaper Society. How many more plaintiffs will join the fray before the combined investigation concludes? More importantly, will any penalties be imposed that can even scratch the tech powerhouse?
Cynthia Murrell, October 19, 2022
Proposed EU Rule Would Allow Citizens to Seek Restitution for Harmful AI
October 10, 2022
It looks like the European Commission is taking the potential for algorithms to cause harm seriously. The Register reports, “Europe Just Might Make it Easier for People to Sue for Damage Caused by AI Tech.” Vice-president for values and transparency V?ra Jourová frames the measure as a way to foster trust in AI technologies. Apparently EU officials believe technical innovation is helped when the public knows appropriate guardrails are in place. What an interesting perspective. Writer Katyanna Quach describes:
“The proposed AI Liability Directive aims to do a few things. One main goal is updating product liability laws so that they effectively cover machine-learning systems and lower the burden-of-proof for a compensation claimant. This ought to make it easier for people to claim compensation, provided they can prove damage was done and that it’s likely a trained model was to blame. This means someone could, for instance, claim compensation if they believe they’ve been discriminated against by AI-powered recruitment software. The directive opens the door to claims for compensation following privacy blunders and damage caused by poor safety in the context of an AI system gone wrong. Another main aim is to give people the right to demand from organizations details of their use of artificial intelligence to aid compensation claims. That said, businesses can provide proof that no harm was done by an AI and can argue against giving away sensitive information, such as trade secrets. The directive is also supposed to give companies a clear understanding and guarantee of what the rules around AI liability are.”
Officials hope such clarity will encourage developers to move forward with AI technologies without the fear of being blindsided by unforeseen allegations. Another goal is to build the current patchwork of AI standards and legislation across Europe into a cohesive set of rules. Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders declares citizen protection top priority, stating, “technologies like drones or delivery services operated by AI can only work when consumers feel safe and protected.” Really? I’d like to see US officials tell that to Amazon.
Cynthia Murrell, October 10, 2022
The FCC Springs into Action Regarding IS Ps
October 10, 2022
The easiest way to describe the COVID-19 pandemic is that it sucked. People died, paychecks were cut, pandemic pets were returned to shelters, and now no one wants to leave their houses. An even worse side effect is that bad actors filed false claims with US government offices to receive relief funds. Light Reading explains how bad actors took advantage of of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP): “FCC Inspector General Says ‘Dozens’ Of ISPs Claimed Fraudulent ACP Funds.”
The FCC Office of Inspector General (OIG) noted that a dozen broadband providers (ISPs) fraudulently enrolled for ACPs. The bad-acting ISPs enrolled a single individual multiple times for ACP reimbursements amounting to thousands of dollars. The scams were conducted in Texas, Ohio, Alabama, and Oklahoma; the latter turned out to be the worst offender. ISPs are responsible for ensuring which households are eligible under the ACP rules. The government is cracking down on fraud:
“Following the release of the report, the Wireline Competition Bureau published a public notice outlining new steps it’s implementing to “limit opportunities for waste, fraud, and abuse” with the ACP. As per the notice, the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC) is improving the measures it uses to verify BQPs [benefit qualifying person] as well as instituting processes to hold payments and de-enroll households that used the same BQP.”
A total of $14.2 billion was allotted to the ACP, but less than half of that amount is reaching those who truly need the assistance:
“According to an ACP dashboard from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR) and Community Networks, just 13 million qualifying households in the US are enrolled out of an eligible 37 million, or 36.5% of the population. That includes 40% of eligible Oklahomans, where the FCC report cites its most egregious example of ACP fraud.”
ACP funding is predicted to run out by March 2025 and if enrollment is boosted by 50% that money is gone by April 2024.
The ACP needs more funds and needs to weed out fraudulent claims. At the rate the US government acts, it is going to take a long time to do either. It will probably be faster than Mexico’s, France’s, and India’s notoriously slow governments.
Whitney Grace, October 10, 2022
ISPs: The Tension Is Not Resolved
October 7, 2022
The deck is stacked against individual consumers, but sometimes the law favors them such as in a recent case in Maine. The Associate Press shared the good news in the story, “Internet Service Providers Drop Challenge Of Privacy Laws.” Maine has one of the strictest Internet privacy laws and it prevents service providers from using, selling, disclosing, or providing access to consumers’ personal information without their consent.
Industry associations and corporations armed with huge budgets and savvy lawyers sued the state claiming the law violated their First Amendment rights. A judge rejected the lawsuit, protecting the little guy. The industry associations agreed to pay $55,000 the state accrued protecting the law. The ACLU helped out as well:
“Supporters of Maine’s law include the ACLU of Maine, which filed court papers in the case in favor of keeping the law on the books. The ACLU said in court papers that the law was ‘narrowly drawn to directly advance Maine’s substantial interests in protecting consumers’ privacy, freedom of expression, and security.’
Democratic Gov. Janet Mills has also defended the law as “common sense.”
Maine is also the home of another privacy law that regulates the use of facial recognition technology. That law, which came on the books last year, has also been cited as the strictest of its kind in the U.S.”
This is yet another example of corporate America thinking about profits over consumer rights and protections. There is a drawback, however: locating criminals. Many modern criminal cases are solved with access to a criminal’s Internet data. Bad actors forgo their rights when they commit crimes, so they should not be protected by these laws. The unfortunate part is that some people disagree.
How about we use this reasoning: the average person is protected by everyone that participates in sex trafficking, pedophilia, and stealing tons of money are not protected by the law. The basic black and white text should do to the truck
Whitney Grace, October 7, 2022
High-Speed Internet in Rural America? No, the Map Is Not the Territory
October 6, 2022
One would expect the United States government to have a detailed map of the country’s broadband services. A map of this nature provides valuable information and insights for many federal departments. Ars Technica reports differently in the article: “FCC Has Obtained Detailed Broadband Maps From ISPs For The First Time Ever.”
The Federal Communications Commission Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel stated that her organization has conducted a years-long process of collecting the necessary information to create an exhaustive broadband map. This map contains extensive location-by-location information on precisely where all broadband services are available.
Past broadband service maps were based on the Form 477 data-collection program that counted one census block as broadband accessible even if only one location was served. The new maps will help distribute funds from the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program that Congress established in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
Rosenworcel is determined to close the availability gap for Internet services, especially in rural and under-serviced areas. The first edition of the map will then be constantly updated based on new data:
“The FCC is continuing to improve the location dataset’s accuracy ‘through additional data sources, such as LIDAR data and new satellite and aerial imagery sources, as they become available,’ Rosenworcel wrote. The FCC also set up a process for broadband providers to submit new data as they upgrade and expand networks. ‘When the first draft is released, it will provide a far more accurate picture of broadband availability in the United States than our old maps ever did,’ Rosenworcel wrote. ‘That’s worth celebrating. But our work will in no way be done. That’s because these maps are iterative. They are designed to be updated, refined, and improved over time.’”
It is almost the end of 2022, the Internet has been around since the mid-1990, and the US government is finally getting around to a detailed ISP map? Why did it take so long? It makes sense that when the technology was new it was hard to collect data, but it could still have been done. They could have used telephone records when the Internet was still on dial-up, then when it transitioned to other services they could have asked companies to submit their data. If companies refused to share their data, that is when the government would impose fees and subpoena the information.
The information could have been overlaid, then with big data, all these algorithms could have been used to analyze the information. Automation might have been installed to keep the map updated. Surely it would have been cheaper compared to other federal programs. I bet they have detailed broadband maps in other countries, especially the smaller ones with high standards of living. Or not. Bureaucracy is notoriously slow everywhere.
Whitney Grace, October 6, 2022
TikTok: A Stream of Weaponized Information?
October 4, 2022
Much of GenZ is now using TikTok as a Google substitute. It seems logical: If one is already spending hours each day on the platform, why not pull up its search function whenever one has a question? Mashable supplies one good reason in, “TikTok’s Search Suggests Misinformation Almost 20 Percent of the Time, Says Report.” Reporter Amanda Yeo cites new research from NewsGuard as she writes:
“When looking for prominent news stories in September, the fact checking organisation found misinformation in almost 20 percent of videos surfaced by the app’s search engine. 540 TikTok videos were analysed as part of this investigation, with 105 found to contain ‘false or misleading claims.’ ‘This means that for searches on topics ranging from the Russian invasion of Ukraine to school shootings and COVID vaccines, TikTok’s users are consistently fed false and misleading claims,’ wrote NewsGuard. NewsGuard’s study also noted that while the four U.S.-based analysts partaking in this study used both neutral and more conspiracy-laden search terms, TikTok itself often suggested controversial terms. Typing in ‘climate change’ may cause the app to suggest searching ‘climate change doesn’t exist,’ and searching ‘COVID vaccine’ might prompt it to suggest tacking ‘exposed’ onto the end. Mashable’s own test from an existing Australian account found only innocuous phrases such as ‘getting my COVID vaccine’ when searching for the latter phrase, however typing in ‘climate change’ did cause TikTok to suggest the search term ‘climate change is a myth.”
Of particular concern is dangerous misinformation about abortion. As access to a safe abortion is blocked or threatened in more and more states, people are seeking alternatives online. Often what they find on TikTok, however, is at best ineffective and at worst lethal. TikTok points to its community guidelines and insists it not only removes dangerous misinformation but also elevates authoritative health-related content and partners with fact checkers. But since the very foundation of the platform rests on user-created and user-shared content, fighting misinformation is a Sisyphean task. It does seem TikTok could at least teach its algorithm not to suggest conspiracy theories. One thing is clear: It remains up to users to protect their own safety by checking facts and considering sources.
Cynthia Murrell, October 4, 2022
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