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Articles Posted in Privacy

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Superman and the CCPA: Not-So-Secret Identities and the Power of “Personal Information” under the California Consumer Privacy Act

Protecting consumer data privacy in the age of artificial intelligence and increased digital commerce is a growing concern. In June 2018, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) introduced provisions to protect consumers and became the first U.S. law that can be viewed as a response to GDPR. Going into effect…

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Facial Recognition Technology May Soon Gain Some New Wrinkles

No one knows your face as well as your iPhone does. All the unique variances of your face that make it yours and yours alone, these are all data points that your iPhone uses to unlock your phone using a face in place of a thumbprint. This same data that…

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Of Memes and Monetizing: Could the EU Directive on Copyright Change the Way We Speak Internet?

Do you like getting your news online, sharing videos or tweeting memes? A little piece of legislation known as The European Union Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market may signal the end of some of the internet’s simple pleasures. On September 13, the European Parliament approved new legislation…

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Homeland Insecurity: Citing Insufficient Safeguards, the EU Moves to Suspend the Privacy Shield Protocol

The European Parliament adopted a resolution earlier this month to suspend the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield agreement. The Privacy Shield is a protocol that provides for the exchange of personal data between the EU and the United States for commercial purposes. Adopted in 2016 after the European Court of Justice invalidated…

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Livestream Bait and Twitch: Are You Part of Someone Else’s Reality Show?

Every day, millions of people are being unwittingly recorded by others. Every person you see walking down the street likely has a means to record your image and transmit it to billions of people at a whim. But, would you have ever expected that your Lyft or Uber ride was…

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The Dangers of Training Neural Networks with Phone Calls

If you haven’t seen Sundar Pichai’s presentation on Google Duplex, watch it. The technology is fascinating. Google is developing software that can assist users in completing specific tasks such as making reservations by telephone. The software uses anonymized phone conversations as the basis for its neural network and in conjunction…

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Debtors Beware: Social Media Knows Where Your Assets Are Buried

If there’s a golden rule for the online age we live in, it’s “Always assume anything you post online will be visible to all.” Just like the original Golden Rule, it’s a maxim ignored often enough to bear repeating and frequent illustration. With that in mind, let’s check in on…

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Deepfakes, Privacy Rights and an AI-Powered Blurring of the Lines

Recent developments in deep learning artificial intelligence have enabled almost anyone to superimpose facial features—including an entirely different face—into a preexisting video with relatively minimal effort. Until very recently, editing facial features in a video has been incredibly difficult. Even movie studios with access to professional video editing tools have…

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Taking It Personally: One Lawsuit Tries to Hold Individuals Accountable for the Equifax Data Breach

As we discussed recently, the Equifax data breach has inevitably brought a great deal of scrutiny and legal action against the credit reporting agency. Amidst the numerous brewing class actions and other reactions from government agencies and state AGs, it’s worth pointing out another front on which the company—and more…

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When Ripples Become Waves: The Equifax Cybersecurity Incident

Since September 7, 2017, Equifax, one of three credit rating agencies in the United States, has been dealing with the fallout from one of the largest (known) data breaches of personal information, putting 143 million Americans at risk from fraud and identity theft (roughly 44% of the U.S. population). What…