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<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?> <rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/" xmlns:snf="http://www.smartnews.be/snf" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" version="2.0"> <channel> <title>The Markup</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/</link> <description>All stories from The Markup</description> <atom:link href="https://themarkup.org/feeds/rss.xml" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"/> <docs>http://www.rssboard.org/rss-specification</docs> <generator>python-feedgen</generator> <image> <url>https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/static/img/social-icons/rss-logo.png</url> <title>The Markup</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/</link> </image> <lastBuildDate>Wed, 27 Nov 2024 07:29:34 +0000</lastBuildDate> <snf:logo> <url>https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/static/img/smartnews/markup-logo.png</url> </snf:logo> <snf:darkModeLogo> <url>https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/static/img/smartnews/markup-logo-dark.png</url> </snf:darkModeLogo> <item> <title>Why Silicon Valley Is Trying So Hard to Kill This AI Bill in California</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/artificial-intelligence/2024/08/12/why-silicon-valley-is-trying-so-hard-to-kill-this-ai-bill-in-california</link> <description>The sprawling California legislation offers protection to whistleblowers and citizens. The coming weeks could decide its fate</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>The sprawling California legislation offers protection to whistleblowers and citizens. The coming weeks could decide its fate</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/051424-Google-AI-AP-CM-1682x946.jpg" alt="" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Photo by Jeff Chiu, AP Photo </figcaption> </figure> </div> Though lawmakers and advocates proposed dozens of bills to regulate artificial intelligence in California this year, none have attracted more disdain from big tech companies, startup founders, and investors than the Safe and Secure Innovation for Frontier Artificial Intelligence Models Act. In letters to lawmakers, Meta said the legislation, <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/bills/ca_202320240sb1047?slug=CA_202320240SB1047">Senate Bill 1047</a>, will “deter AI innovation in California at a time where we should be promoting it,” while Google claimed the bill will make “California one of the world’s least favorable jurisdictions for AI development and deployment.” A letter signed by more than 130 startup founders and incubator Y Combinator goes even further, claiming that “vague language” could “kill California tech.” Prominent AI researchers are also taking sides. Last week, Yoshua Bengio and former Google AI researcher Geoffrey Hinton, who are sometimes called the “godfathers of AI,” <a href="https://safesecureai.org/experts">came out in support</a> of the bill. Stanford professor and former Google Cloud chief AI scientist Fei-Fei Li, who is often called the “godmother of AI” <a href="https://fortune.com/2024/08/06/godmother-of-ai-says-californias-ai-bill-will-harm-us-ecosystem-tech-politics/">came out against SB 1047</a>.  The bill, approved 32-1 by the state Senate in May, must survive the Assembly Appropriations suspense file on Thursday and win final approval by Aug. 31 to reach Gov. Gavin Newsom this year.  The bill, introduced by San Francisco Democrat Scott Wiener in February, is sprawling. It would: <ul> <li>Require developers of the most costly and powerful AI tools to test whether they can enable attacks on public infrastructure, highly damaging cyber attacks, or mass casualty events; or can help create chemical, biological, radioactive, or nuclear weapons. </li> <li>Establish CalCompute, a public “cloud” of shared computers that could be used to help build and host AI tools, to offer an alternative to the small handful of big tech companies offering cloud computing services, to conduct research into what the bill calls “the safe and secure deployment of large-scale artificial intelligence models,” and to foster the equitable development of technology.</li> <li>Protect whistleblowers at companies that are building advanced forms of AI and contractors to those companies.</li> </ul> </ul> The latter protections are among the reasons whistleblower and former OpenAI employee Daniel Kokotajlo supports SB 1047, he told CalMatters. He also likes that it takes steps toward more transparency and democratic governance around artificial intelligence, a technology he describes as “completely unregulated.” Kokotajlo earlier this year quit his job as a governance researcher at OpenAI, the San Francisco-based company behind the popular ChatGPT tool. Shortly thereafter he <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/04/technology/openai-culture-whistleblowers.html">went public</a> with allegations that he witnessed a violation of internal safety protocols at the company. OpenAI was “recklessly racing” toward its stated <a href="https://openai.com/index/planning-for-agi-and-beyond/">goal of creating</a> artificial intelligence that surpasses human intelligence, Koktajlo <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/04/technology/openai-culture-whistleblowers.html">told the New York Times</a>. Kokotajlo also believes that advanced AI could contribute to the extinction of humanity — and that employees developing that technology are in the best position to guard against this. In June, Kokotajlo joined more than a dozen current and former employees of OpenAI and Google in <a href="https://righttowarn.ai/">calling for enhanced protections for AI whistleblowers</a>. Those workers were not the first to do so; Google employees <a href="https://venturebeat.com/ai/google-employee-group-urges-congress-to-strengthen-whistleblower-protections-for-ai-researchers/">spoke out in 2021</a> after co-leads of the Ethical AI team were fired. That same year, Ifeyoma Ozoma, the author of a <a href="https://techworkerhandbook.org/">tech whistleblower handbook</a> and a former Instagram employee, cosponsored California’s Silenced No More Act, a state law passed in 2022 to give workers the right to talk about discrimination and harassment even if they signed a non-disclosure agreement. Kokotaljo said he believes that, had SB 1047 been in effect, it would have either prevented, or led an employee to promptly report, the safety violation he said he witnessed in 2022, involving an early deployment of an OpenAI model by Microsoft to a few thousand users in India without approval. “I think that when push comes to shove, and a lot of money and power and reputation is on the line, things are moving very quickly with powerful new models,” he told CalMatters. “I don’t think the company should be trusted to follow their own procedures appropriately.”  When asked about Kokotajlo’s comments and OpenAI’s treatment of whistleblowers, OpenAI spokesperson Liz Bourgeois said company policy protects employees’ rights to raise issues.  Existing law primarily protects whistleblowers from retaliation in cases involving violation of state law, but SB 1047 would protect employees like Kokotajlo by giving them the right to report to the attorney general or labor commissioner any AI model that is capable of causing critical harm. The bill also prevents employers from blocking the disclosure of related information. Whistleblower protections in SB 1047 were expanded <a href="https://apcp.assembly.ca.gov/system/files/2024-06/sb-1047-wiener-apcp-analysis_0.pdf">following a recommendation</a> by the Assembly Privacy and Consumer Protection committee in June. That recommendation came shortly after the letter from workers at Google and OpenAI, after OpenAI <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/17/openai-superalignment-sutskever-leike.html#:~:text=OpenAI%20has%20disbanded%20its%20team,from%20the%20Microsoft%2Dbacked%20startup.">disbanded a safety and security committee</a>, and<a href="https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/351132/openai-vested-equity-nda-sam-altman-documents-employees"> after Vox reported</a> that OpenAI forced people leaving the company to sign nondisparagement agreements or forfeit stock options worth up to millions of dollars. The protections address a concern from the letter that existing whistleblower protections are insufficient “because they focus on illegal activity, whereas many of the risks we are concerned about are not yet regulated.” <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft"><blockquote>Employees must be able to report dangerous practices without fear of retaliation.<cite>California Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, Democrat from San Ramon</cite></blockquote></figure> OpenAI spokesperson Hannah Wong said the company removed nondisparagement terms affecting departing employees. Despite these changes, last month a group of former OpenAI employees <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/07/13/openai-safety-risks-whistleblower-sec/">urged the Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate</a> nondisclosure agreements at the company as possible violations of  an <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2023/10/30/executive-order-on-the-safe-secure-and-trustworthy-development-and-use-of-artificial-intelligence/">executive order signed</a> by President Joe Biden last year to reduce risks posed by artificial intelligence.  Bay Area Democrat <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/legislators/rebecca-bauer-kahan-165035">Rebecca Bauer-Kahan</a>, who leads the Assembly Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee, said she helped add the whistleblower protections to SB 1047 because industry insiders have reported feeling muzzled by punitive non-disclosure agreements, even as more of them speak out about problems with AI.  “If Californians are going to feel comfortable engaging with these novel technologies, employees must be able to report dangerous practices without fear of retaliation,” she said in a written statement. “The protections the government provides should not be limited to the known risks of advanced AI, as these systems may be capable of causing harms that we cannot yet predict.” <h2>Industry Says Bill Imperils Open Source, Startups</h2> As vocal as they’ve been in opposing SB 1047, tech giants have said little about the bill’s whistleblower protections, including in lengthy letters that Meta, Microsoft, and Google sent to lawmakers. Google declined to comment about those provisions, while Meta declined to make California public policy lead Kevin McKinley available for comment. OpenAI pointed to a previous comment by Bourgeois that stated, “We believe rigorous debate about this technology is essential. OpenAI’s whistleblower policy protects employees’ rights to raise issues, including to any national, federal, state, or local government agency.” Instead, opponents have highlighted the bill’s AI testing requirements and other safety provisions, saying compliance costs could kneecap startups and other small businesses. This would hurt the state economy, they add, since California is <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/technology/2024/03/california-ai-rules-business/">a center of the AI industry</a>. The bill, however,  limits its AI restrictions to systems that cost more than $100 million, or require more than a certain quantity of computing power to train. Supporters say the vast majority of startups won’t be covered by the bill. Opponents counter that small businesses would still suffer because SB 1047 would have a chilling effect on individuals and groups that release AI models and tools free to the public as open source software. Such software is widely used by startups, holding down costs and providing them a basis on which to build new tools. Meta has argued that developers of AI software will be less likely to release it as open source out of fear they will be held responsible for all the ways their code might be used by others. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignright"><blockquote>If we over regulate, if we over indulge and chase a shiny object, we can put ourselves in a perilous position.<cite>California Governor Gavin Newsom</cite></blockquote></figure> Open source software has a long history in California and has played a central role in the development of AI. In 2018, Google <a href="https://research.google/blog/open-sourcing-bert-state-of-the-art-pre-training-for-natural-language-processing/">released as open source</a> its influential “BERT,” an AI model that laid the groundwork for large language models such as the one behind ChatGPT and that sparked an AI arms race between companies including Google, Microsoft, and Nvidia. Other open source software tools have also played important roles in the spread of AI, including Apache Spark, which helps distribute computing tasks across multiple machines,  and Google’s TensorFlow and Meta’s PyTorch, both of which allow developers to incorporate machine learning techniques into their software. Meta has gone farther than its competitors in releasing the source code to its own large language model, Llama, which has been <a href="https://ai.meta.com/blog/meta-llama-3-1/#:~:text=Now%2C%20we're%20ushering%20in,we're%20just%20getting%20started.">downloaded more than 300 million times</a>. In a <a href="https://static.politico.com/e0/fd/e56dfaad40b39f29dd1dfa1164da/sb-1047-letter-6-25-24.pdf">letter sent to Wiener</a> in June, Meta deputy chief privacy officer Rob Sherman argued that the bill would “deter AI innovation in California at a time when we should be promoting it” and discourage release of open source models like Llama. Ion Stoica is a professor at the University of California, Berkeley and cofounder of Databricks, an AI company built on Apache Spark. If SB 1047 passes, <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/hearings/258167?t=2881&f=cbf8f5a8ecec888903d75e81d5b4d15d">he predicts</a> that within a year open source models from overseas, likely China, will overtake those made in the United States. Three of the top six top open source models available today come from China, according to the <a href="https://sky.cs.berkeley.edu/project/chatbot-arena/">Chatbot Arena evaluation method</a> Stoica helped devise.  Open source defenders also voiced opposition to SB 1047 at a town hall hosted with Wiener at GitHub, an open source repository owned by Microsoft, and a generative AI symposium held in May. Governor Gavin Newsom, who has not taken a position on the legislation, told the audience it’s important to respond to AI inventors like Geoffrey Hinton who insist on the need for regulation , but also said he wants California to remain an AI leader and advised lawmakers against overreach. “If we over regulate, if we over indulge and chase a shiny object, we can put ourselves in a perilous position,” the governor said. “At the same time we have an obligation to lead.” <h2>Aiming To Protect Tech Workers and Society</h2> Sunny Gandhi, vice president of government affairs at Encode Justice, a nonprofit focused on bringing young people into the fight against AI harms and a cosponsor of the bill, said it has sparked a backlash because tech firms are not used to being held responsible for the effects of their products  “It’s very different and terrifying for them that they are now being held to the same standards that pretty much all other products are in America,” Ghandi said.” There are liability provisions in there, and liability is alien to tech. That’s what they’re worried about.”  Wiener has disputed some criticisms of his bill, including a claim, in a <a href="https://static.politico.com/95/0a/a317efe44616af436ce6a4f32647/founder-led-statement-on-sb1047-june-20-2024-2.pdf">letter</a> circulated by startup incubator Y Combinator and signed by more than 130 startup founders, that the legislation could end up sending software developers “to jail simply for failing to anticipate misuse of their software.” That assertion arose from the fact that the bill requires builders of sufficiently large language models to submit their test results to the state and makes them guilty of perjury if they lie about the design or testing of an AI model. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft"><blockquote>It’s very different and terrifying for them that they are now being held to the same standards that pretty much all other products are in America.<cite>Sunny Gandhi, vice president of government affairs at Encode Justice</cite></blockquote></figure> Wiener said his office started listening to members of the tech community last fall before the bill was introduced and made a number of amendments to ensure the law only applies to major AI labs. Now is the time to act, he told startup founders, “because I don’t have any confidence the federal government is going to act” to regulate AI. Within the past year, major AI labs signed on to testing and safety commitments with the <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/07/22/1095193/ai-companies-promised-the-white-house-to-self-regulate-one-year-ago-whats-changed/">White House</a> and at international gatherings in the <a href="https://time.com/6962503/ai-artificial-intelligence-uk-us-safety/">United Kingdom</a>, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/ai-generated-election-deepfakes-munich-accord-meta-google-microsoft-tiktok-x-c40924ffc68c94fac74fa994c520fc06">Germany</a>, and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/global-ai-summit-seoul-aims-forge-new-regulatory-agreements-2024-05-21/">South Korea</a>, but those agreements are voluntary. President Biden has called on Congress to regulate artificial intelligence but it has yet to do so. Wiener also said the bill is important because the Republican Party vowed, in the <a href="https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/2024-republican-party-platform">platform</a> it adopted last month, to <a href="https://time.com/6996927/republicans-repeal-biden-ai-executive-order/">repeal Biden’s executive order</a>, arguing that the order stifles innovation. In legislative hearings, Wiener has said it’s important to require compliance because “we don’t know who will run these companies in a year or five years and what kind of profit pressures those companies will face at that time.” AI company Anthropic, which is based in San Francisco, came out in support of the bill if a number of amendments are made, including doing away with a government entity called the Frontier Models Division. That division, which would review certifications from developers, establish an accreditation process for those who audit AI, and issue guidance on how to limit harms from advanced AI. Wiener told the Y Combinator audience he’d be open to doing away with the division. Kokotajlo, the whistleblower,  calls SB 1047 both a step in the right direction and not enough to prevent the potential harms of AI. He and the other signatories of the June <a href="http://righttowarn.ai">letter</a> have called on companies that are developing AI to create their own processes whereby current and former employees could anonymously report concerns to independent organizations with the expertise to verify whether concern is called for or not. “Sometimes the people who are worried will turn out to be wrong, and sometimes, I think the people who are worried will turn out to be right,” he said. In remarks at Y Combinator last month, Wiener thanked members of open source and AI communities for sharing critiques of the bill that led to amendments, but he also urged people to remember what happened when <a href="https://privacy.ca.gov/about-us/about-the-cppa/">California passed privacy law in 2018</a> following years of inaction by the federal government.  “A lot of folks in the tech world were opposed to that bill and told us that everyone was going to leave California if we passed it. We passed it. That did not happen, and we set a standard that I think was a really powerful one.” ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79705</guid> <pubDate>Mon, 12 Aug 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Khari Johnson </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/051424-Google-AI-AP-CM.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/artificial-intelligence/2024/08/12/why-silicon-valley-is-trying-so-hard-to-kill-this-ai-bill-in-california'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>CalMatters/The Markup Honored for Leadership in Diversity and Solidarity, Community Innovation, by Asian American Journalists Association</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2024/08/13/calmatters-the-markup-honored-for-leadership-in-diversity-and-solidarity-community-innovation-by-asian-american-journalists-association</link> <description>The awards honor thoughtful reporting, thorough coverage and strong storytelling and celebrate stories that would have gone untold without the cultural competence that AAJA journalists bring to the profession</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>The awards honor thoughtful reporting, thorough coverage and strong storytelling and celebrate stories that would have gone untold without the cultural competence that AAJA journalists bring to the profession</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/aaja-award-sisi-lam-v2-1682x946.jpg" alt="Sisi Wei (left) won the leadership in diversity and solidarity award and Lam Thuy Vo (right) won the inaugural AAJA-Medill innovator award" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> </figcaption> </figure> </div> CalMatters/The Markup recently won two prestigious awards at the Asian American Journalists Association 2024 convention, this year in Austin, Texas. Chief Impact Officer Sisi Wei won <a href="https://awards.aaja.org/2024-community-awards/leadership-in-diversity-solidarity">the leadership in diversity and solidarity award</a>, and investigative reporter Lam Thuy Vo won the <a href="https://awards.aaja.org/2024-community-awards/aaja-medill-innovator-award">inaugural AAJA-Medill innovator award</a>.   Judges said, “Sisi Wei is a transformative leader who has turned The Markup into a diverse organization dedicated to having a real-world impact on people’s lives.” <a href="https://themarkup.org/people/sisi-wei">Wei was editor-in-chief of The Markup</a> from 2022-24, and this year, The Markup joined with CalMatters, to build a powerhouse California-rooted nonprofit, independent and nonpartisan news organization. Her honor recognized her past (and continued) trailblazing work in creating journalism with a clear mandate to have real-world impact on people’s lives. The value of diversity is evident through Wei’s leadership at The Markup, both through how she approached hiring and staffing a diverse newsroom, and how she guided the team in producing thoughtful, award-winning journalism serving historically marginalized communities. During her first year as editor-in-chief, she <a href="https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2023/01/18/five-ways-toward-a-fairer-more-transparent-hiring-process">redefined The Markup’s hiring practices</a> to be among the most respectful and equitable in the industry. As a result, over the course of 12 months, The Markup’s newsroom staff grew from 39% to 65% journalists of color, and its editorial leadership team grew to 60% women of color. The Markup’s journalism and mission, under Sisi’s guidance, also transformed from reporting on how technology shapes our lives, to challenging technology to serve the public good, and for its journalism to have <a href="https://themarkup.org/series/impact">a real-world impact</a>. In addition to The Markup’s major investigations highlighting how people have used technology and algorithms to directly harm <a href="https://themarkup.org/machine-learning/2023/04/27/false-alarm-how-wisconsin-uses-race-and-income-to-label-students-high-risk">students</a>, <a href="https://themarkup.org/investigation/2023/02/28/l-a-s-scoring-system-for-subsidized-housing-gives-black-and-latino-people-experiencing-homelessness-lower-priority-scores">unhoused people</a>, and anyone <a href="https://themarkup.org/series/still-loading">suffering from the digital divide</a>, for the first time, The Markup also published stories <a href="https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2023/12/23/meet-the-people-taking-the-markup-reporting-off-the-page-and-into-real-life">by community members themselves</a>, amplifying their voice, their perspectives, and the solutions they’ve come up with as a part of multiple investigative packages.  “Throughout her career, Wei has valued helping fellow journalists of color succeed,” judges said. “She is a longtime mentor of multiple AAJA members—often those who are struggling to find a way to combine journalism, data, and technology—because she wants to pass forward the extraordinary mentorship she received from AAJA past president Paul Cheung.” Former Markup investigative reporter Lam Thuy Vo was awarded the inaugural AAJA-Medill Innovator Community Award, for her fresh and innovative way of approaching AAPI issues in journalism. Judges said, “Lam Thuy Vo has pioneered what it means to truly serve the AAPI communities she reports on. Going beyond the journalism itself, Vo used what she learned during her reporting on misinformation in Vietnamese immigrant communities to create a misinformation workshop tailored to that community. After publishing, Vo returned in person to give the workshop. Her journalism not only highlights AAPI issues but also highlights how misinformation coverage has long ignored the specific issues experienced by AAPI communities.” Vo’s series on the impact of misinformation on the Vietnamese immigrant community, “<a href="https://themarkup.org/series/languages-of-misinformation">Languages of Misinformation</a>,” <a href="https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2024/05/28/the-markup-wins-aaja-journalism-excellence-award">also won</a> the Asian American Journalism Association’s <a href="https://awards.aaja.org/2024-journalism-excellence-awards/excellence-in-online-digital-journalism-engagement">excellence in online/digital journalism engagement award</a> earlier this year. Judges said the series “brilliantly tackled misinformation on YouTube, hitting home for the Vietnamese and wider AAPI communities. By teaming up with Mai Bui, a 67-year-old YouTuber grandma, and crafting a guide for younger Vietnamese Americans, the work didn’t just tell a story—it gave a platform to real voices and bridged generational gaps. The multi-layered approach to connecting with the audience sets the work apart, making it a standout choice for the category.” Congratulations too, to all of this year’s <a href="https://awards.aaja.org/2024-journalism-excellence-awards">AAJA award winners</a>. <h2>CalMatters’ and AAJA continue training high school journalists</h2> CalMatters partnered for a <a href="https://calmatters.org/inside-the-newsroom/2023/09/calmatters-journalism-programs-empower-students-and-educators/">second year</a> with the association on <a href="https://www.jcal.news/about/">the JCal program</a>, a summer training program for high school journalists. The work is part of CalMatters’ various programs dedicated to advancing <a href="https://calmatters.org/youthjournalism/">youth journalism</a>. “AAJA is proud to be partnering with CalMatters again for this program’s second year. Last year’s cohort produced incredible work on the impact of climate change and drought on California’s communities, many of which were published by local news outlets. We’re thankful for the AAJA members and local newsrooms who supported JCal students, and we are excited for a second year of developing and training aspiring California journalists,” said AAJA Executive Director Naomi Tacuyan Underwood. “We are excited to continue working with AAJA to help nurture the careers of these talented young journalists,” said CalMatters Editor-in-Chief Kristen Go. “They help make their communities richer by the stories they tell. Watching their excitement and partnership with their mentors is inspiring and energizing.” Over five days in mid-June, the 22 students produced stories under the mentorship of 11 professionals and gained first hand experience in reporting on projects themed around California’s next workforce. <a href="https://www.aaja.org/2024/05/14/jcal-aaja-and-calmatters-program-for-california-high-school-students-selects-22-students-for-2024-cohort/">This year’s students</a> came to Sacramento from across the state, including Granite Bay, Fresno, San Diego, Atascadero and beyond. Mentors included journalists from The New York Times, KAZU, Berkeleyside and The Desert Sun. “With CalMatters as a partner and fortified by key mentors, AAJA aims to provide students with the introduction to ethical journalism practices and exposure to newsroom workflow through various curated sessions and activations,” said AAJA Director of Special Initiatives Felicia Chanco “The impact of JCal goes beyond the week we host the cohort in Sacramento. After closely working with the students, it is inspiring to know these students will soon step into their potential of being the next generation of media professionals that are community-responsive and equity-minded. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79663</guid> <pubDate>Tue, 13 Aug 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Sonya Quick </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/aaja-award-sisi-lam-v2-2400x1350.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/inside-the-markup/2024/08/13/calmatters-the-markup-honored-for-leadership-in-diversity-and-solidarity-community-innovation-by-asian-american-journalists-association'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>The Markup’s “Clear and Beautiful” Reporting Wins Online Journalism Award</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2024/08/17/the-markups-clear-and-beautiful-reporting-wins-online-journalism-award</link> <description>Series on digital book banning wins first place for technology reporting — the Markup’s second win in a row in that category.</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>Series on digital book banning wins first place for technology reporting — the Markup’s second win in a row in that category.</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/digital-book-banning-ona-award-1-1682x946.jpg" alt="Collage of the five stories from the Digital Book Banning series that won the 2024 ONA Excellence in Technology Reporting Award" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> The Markup </figcaption> </figure> </div> The Markup’s investigative series on internet censorship in schools, “<a href="https://themarkup.org/series/digital-book-banning">Digital Book Banning</a>,” has won the Online News Association’s <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/entries/digital-book-banning/">Excellence in Technology Reporting award</a> in the small newsroom category. The award recognizes excellence in digital journalism covering all aspects of technology, including culture, policy, and economic impact. Judges said “this investigation uses technology, FOIA and crowdsourcing to discover a content censorship criteria and presents it in a clear and beautiful way. This team also explains its behind-the-scenes efforts so everyone can learn or get inspired by their cases to amplify impact.” The honor marks a back-to-back win for The Markup, which last year <a href="https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2023/08/28/the-markup-wins-ona-award-in-technology-reporting">took the same prize</a> for its coverage of internet bandwidth disparities. The most recent investigation emerged at a time of high-profile book bans in schools and public libraries across the country, focusing on less-examined “digital book bans,” in which internet access for K-12 students is censored.  Markup journalists spent months requesting records from school districts, challenging records denials, writing software to test school district blocking patterns, analyzing censorship records, and interviewing students, teachers, attorneys, constitutional law scholars, and advocates. Reporter Tara García Mathewson anchored the reporting in the experiences of students who are routinely prevented from gathering information online. She traveled nearly 1,000 miles to the suburbs of St. Louis, Missouri, to talk to students and families in the Rockwood School District, which had one of the most aggressive web filtering systems of any district examined by The Markup. Tara also spent hours conducting phone and Zoom interviews with students in Texas, California, Michigan, and New York to round out her understanding of the filters’ harms. The team revealed how web filters across 16 school districts in 11 states thwarted basic research and web browsing, forcing some students to resort to workarounds like personal cell phones and others to settle for an inferior educational experience. It also showed how some districts, blocked health and safety resources, including suicide prevention resources for LGBTQ+ teens, abortion information, and sex education, that other districts made available. The investigation also raised questions over whether districts have improperly exceeded the regulations that mandate internet filtering. The <a href="https://themarkup.org/series/digital-book-banning">Digital Book Banning series</a> includes the following pieces: <ul> <li>Main story: <a href="https://themarkup.org/digital-book-banning/2024/04/13/schools-were-just-supposed-to-block-porn-instead-they-sabotaged-homework-and-censored-suicide-prevention-sites">Schools Were Just Supposed To Block Porn. Instead They Sabotaged Homework and Censored Suicide Prevention Sites</a></li> <li>Gallery: <a href="https://themarkup.org/digital-book-banning/2024/04/13/five-high-schoolers-explain-how-web-filters-inhibit-their-learning-and-safety">Five High Schoolers Describe the Dangers and Frustrations of Censored Web Access</a></li> <li>Interactive survey: <a href="https://themarkup.org/digital-book-banning/2024/04/13/does-your-school-block-these-sites">Does Your School Block These Sites?</a></li> <li>Show Your Work: <a href="https://themarkup.org/show-your-work/2024/04/13/how-we-investigated-web-censorship-in-schools">How We Investigated Web Censorship in Schools</a></li> <li>Public resource: <a href="https://themarkup.org/digital-book-banning/2024/04/13/students-how-you-can-investigate-internet-censorship-in-your-school-district">Students: Investigate Internet Censorship in Your School District</a></li> </ul> </ul> Congratulations to the team for the recognition of their hard work: Tara García Mathewson (investigative reporting), Joel Eastwood and Gabriel Hongsdusit (design and development), Tomas Apodaca and Miles Hinton (additional reporting and development), Maria Puertas (engagement and writing), Emerson Malone (copy editing), Ryan Tate and Sisi Wei (editing). In addition, stay tuned for more Online Journalism Award winners to be announced in September. The Markup is a <a href="https://calmatters.bluelena.io/lt.php?x=3DZy~GDKVnPN6pz._A69UeRw2HEmjdghk-03kHI2IXGc6K75yUy.0uJz233ziNDylfYyXIHEIXme5Xz">finalist for general excellence</a> among small newsrooms and a finalist for overall excellence in community-centered journalism for “<a href="https://themarkup.org/series/languages-of-misinformation">Languages of Misinformation</a>.” Also, <a href="https://calmatters.org">CalMatters</a>, of which The Markup is now a part, is an <a href="https://calmatters.bluelena.io/lt.php?x=3DZy~GDKVnPN6pz._A69UeRw2HEmjdghk-03kHI2IXGc6K75yUy.0uJz233ziNDylfYyXIHEIXme5HV">Online Journalism Awards finalist</a> for general excellence among medium newsrooms. Congratulations, too, to all of this year’s <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/winners/2024/">ONA award winners</a>. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79713</guid> <pubDate>Sat, 17 Aug 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Sonya Quick </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/digital-book-banning-ona-award-1-2400x1350.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/inside-the-markup/2024/08/17/the-markups-clear-and-beautiful-reporting-wins-online-journalism-award'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>Rejecting Dogmas Around AI, User Privacy, and Tech Policy</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/08/17/rejecting-dogmas-around-ai-user-privacy-and-tech-policy</link> <description>A conversation with AI scientist Jonathan Frankle</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>A conversation with AI scientist Jonathan Frankle</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/081624_TM_MinhoJung-1682x946.jpg" alt="Illustration of a pixelated pizza with one slice being lifted, set against a background of pixelated circles and envelopes" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Minho Jung </figcaption> </figure> </div>  Hi everyone, It’s Ross. I’m back with some more <a href="https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/04/27/why-governments-need-to-take-a-more-active-role-in-regulating-ai">deep discussion</a> of AI policy. This week, I’m catching up with Jonathan Frankle, Chief Scientist at DataBricks, a data storage and processing platform. Frankle served as the inaugural Staff Technologist at the Center on Privacy and Technology at Georgetown Law, where he worked on police use of facial recognition and co-developed a course on <a href="https://www.cp4l.org/">Computer Programming for Lawyers</a>. After obtaining his PhD, Frankle launched MosaicML, a startup that allowed companies to train LLMs on their own data, which was then acquired by DataBricks last year. He continues to work on AI policy issues, currently with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), whose <a href="https://oecd.ai/en/ai-principles">AI Principles</a> influence policy around the world. I sat down (virtually) with Jonathan Frankle to discuss the ethics of companies using customer data to train models, the growing trend of integrating AI models into our personal devices and lives, and how people can get involved in policy conversations from national to local level. Our conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity. <hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/databricks-employee-photography-nyc-mosaic-15_reduced-1280x1279.jpg" alt="Jonathan Frankle" width="1280" height="1279"> <figcaption> Jonathan Frankle <div style="margin-top: 5px;">DataBricks</div></figcaption></figure> Ross Teixeira: A lot of your work at Databricks is focused around helping customers make the most of the data they have. Facebook and Adobe recently tried to start training generative AI models on their user’s data and got a <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2024/6/10/24175416/adobe-overhauls-terms-of-service-update-firefly">lot</a> of <a href="https://thehackernews.com/2024/06/meta-halts-ai-training-on-eu-user-data.html">pushback</a> from that. Is there overlap with that and the work you do at Databricks? Jonathan Frankle: The nice thing about my role is, we don’t use any customer data for training models. The customer’s data is the customer’s data. That is, like, the most sacred thing in the world. The only places where we’ve even talked about that—and this is actually one of the cooler things I’m more excited about—is inviting our customers to share their evaluation datasets with us for internal use. (Evaluation datasets are example behaviors that a model should follow used to measure how well it is performing.) The science of fine-tuning models is really messy, and a lot of our customers have said, with appropriate security safeguards and appropriate care, “We’ll happily share our evaluation sets with you.” What about our customers and how they use their customer’s data? For a lot of these use cases, it’s bringing new technology to solve existing problems. Our customers are already using machine learning-driven systems—think fraud detection banking. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could use large language models to try to help explain these fraud detection graphs that show up to a human, so that someone can try to make sense of them right away? I’ve seen very few new use cases from our customers. In a “<a href="https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/wlr/vol79/iss1/10/">contextual integrity</a>” view of the world, privacy violations are those in which data is collected in one context and used in another context, especially a context that was not predictable or not foreseeable. So when I look at what our customers are doing, for the most part, user data is used within context, but it’s used to take advantage of newer, fancier, better technology to solve their existing problems or to augment some existing process.  Teixeira: Recently, everyone was thinking Apple was going to roll out their own LLM integration in their recent iOS, and they ended up announcing that they’re going to roll out ChatGPT integration instead. I’m curious if you have thoughts on what might have led to that decision, or what you think this means for the recent trend of personal devices hosting smaller, local, and private AI models. Frankle: I love questions about running AI on personal devices because of trade-offs like: Is your device powerful enough? Do you have access to an unlimited data plan, which is not the case for the majority of mobile users around the world? Then you get into privacy questions, which involves not just “where is the data” and “what is the data being used for,” but also “how do people feel about it?” <a href="https://www.danielsolove.com/">Dan Solove</a>, a leading expert in privacy law, proposed that the mere fact that you feel like you’re being watched is a privacy violation that is impinging on your freedom and your sense that you can speak your mind or take actions. So there are lots of reasons why continuing to compress these models and continuing to get them on devices makes a ton of sense. Updating these models gets really tricky because these are gonna be huge models in terms of storage size, even if they’re very small in terms of compute footprint. So there are technical aspects, there are privacy aspects, and there are user comfort aspects. Teixeira: There’s a big distinction between technical work and policy work, which is very value-driven and needs to understand people. How do you reconcile those two things when you think about how technical knowledge can apply to the policy world? Frankle: I think a lot of times when you get very value driven, you get driven by the world you want to see and sometimes lose a bit of touch with the world as it is, or even how policy has been able to successfully or unsuccessfully affect the world. What I’ve loved about the OECD, just speaking personally, has been they are data-driven. Like, the whole point is they’re a bunch of economists, and economists are boring sometimes, but boring in the best possible way. They love their data. They love their measurement. The OECD has an addiction to trying to measure things. and then trying to use those measurements to inform policy. It’s hard to come up with good measures, but they do a pretty darn good job given how hard it is to measure anything. I think it is hard for people who come from a technical background to accept that there’s not going to be a right answer. And it’s not going to be measurable. And there’s no objective truth, in some sense of policy. But it is about trying to do your best and do your best towards serving whatever your goals are. Ideally, serving society. Teixeira: Can you capture people’s feelings and experiences in a data-oriented way? Frankle: Privacy studies, in particular, have been so much fun to watch over the past few years because you have what people will say in a survey, and then you can go and measure how they actually use their device. And all these amazing surveys show that privacy is the first thing people are willing to give up. There was a study where students were offered pizza if they shared their friends’ email addresses, and a <a href="https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2017/08/pizza-privacy-stanford-economist-examines-paradox-digital-age">bunch of students did</a>. Maybe that says people’s preferences are wrong, and they’re just saying one thing and really they don’t care. Maybe that says that we’ve created a world that’s structured such that it’s really hard for people to take actions that are in line with their preferences. Either way, that’s a policy consideration. But such surveys give us the data to make good decisions. Teixeira: OECD is an international organization, and views about privacy differ greatly between different countries. The United States has a very different sense of what data they want private from other people versus the government, versus Europe or Asia. Do the differences in cultures impact any of any of those policy discussions? Frankle: Oh, they definitely do. It’s really, really satisfying to have those conversations. Hearing very different viewpoints among how we’ve done regulation, such as the sectoral approach in the U.S., with regulation carefully designed for specific areas like transportation or finance, versus the more general approach in the EU, and getting to have conversations about how’s that working on both sides. One example that sticks in my mind is, there was an EU policy figure who said they really wanted to start looking at AI and fake news and democracy. This was relatively early on when these were not exactly the hot questions. I remember wondering, “Why democracy?” Well, countries in the EU have quite recent experiences of what it’s like to not live under democracy, and I can see how that informs a lot of questions around privacy, surveillance, and misinformation in the EU. And perhaps it should inform those questions in the US, as well. Teixeira: Did those conversations ever carry back to your technical work? Was there technical work you changed direction on or put a pause on as a result of being involved in these policy discussions? Frankle: I have never been good at interdisciplinary work. So in my work, I try to get as deep technically as I can, and always keep in mind how I can share what I’ve learned from my technical experience that matters for a policy audience. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignright"><blockquote>Looking back over the past 18 months, I think LLMs have gotten faster and cheaper, but they haven’t really gotten better.<cite>Jonathan Frankle</cite></blockquote></figure> There’s certainly conversations we have around DataBricks among my team about what we should worry or care about. By putting a technology into the world, you can make certain things easier, and that doesn’t always work out in a way that is evenly balanced between good and bad, or intrinsically balanced towards good. Some people are worried for reasons that I’m not as concerned about, such as, “Could AI tell you how to create a novel bioweapon?” Personally, I’m worried about the more mundane, boring stuff. You can fine-tune a model for all sorts of purposes that I think would make a lot of us uncomfortable, such as law enforcement’s use of advanced biometrics that make it easy to track people. And that’s something that really eats me up. Teixeira: In the long-term process of policy, what do you think about the divide between people who say there’s an imminent risk of AI taking over the world, and those who are skeptical of it? Frankle: I think with AI, the tricky part for long-term questions is not just that we’re thinking about the long term, but that we have to make assumptions about the nature of how the technology will evolve. And that is an incredibly fraught topic in any policy domain.  My personal take is that technology doesn’t move in this nice linear way that follows scaling laws. Technology tends to have these big bursts of progress, and then a lot of consolidation. Looking back over the past 18 months, I think LLMs have gotten faster and cheaper, but they haven’t really gotten better. But assuming that technology froze today and GPT-4 was as good as it got, there’s still gonna be decades of innovation on top of that with unimaginably cool and scary things just based on that one capability, in the same way that internet architecture basically froze in the ’90s. In some sense, the fundamental technology hasn’t changed in decades. The same could be true in AI, and we’ll still have our hands full from a policy perspective. Teixeira: One of The Markup’s goals is to help readers restore their agency over technology. Do you have any tips for people that want to get more involved in policy but don’t know how to make their voice heard? Frankle: In terms of how you get in, there are policy conversations happening everywhere. The nice thing about these policy questions is they are not just national or international. Questions of law enforcement use of facial recognition are actually exclusively local, in a sense. They’re the stuff of city council meetings. Your city council has a meeting. Go to it! Go speak!  It doesn’t have to be big things. When you’re at that smaller meeting, you may literally be the only one who shows up to speak about it, and you can have an outsized impact. That can sometimes be a scary thing, but that’s also a really empowering thing. <hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/> Have you gotten involved with technology policy affecting your community? If so, <a href="mailto:ross@themarkup.org">please get in touch</a>! For more on AI, <a href="https://themarkup.org/artificial-intelligence/2024/08/06/californias-two-biggest-school-districts-botched-ai-deals-here-are-lessons-from-their-mistakes">read</a> what happened when two California school districts adopted AI tools, or my <a href="https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/04/27/why-governments-need-to-take-a-more-active-role-in-regulating-ai">discussion with Christelle Tessono</a> of the role of government in regulating AI. Thanks for reading, Ross Teixeira Investigative Data Journalist The Markup / CalMatters ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79678</guid> <pubDate>Sat, 17 Aug 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Ross Teixeira </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/081624_TM_MinhoJung-2400x1350.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/hello-world/2024/08/17/rejecting-dogmas-around-ai-user-privacy-and-tech-policy'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>California Tried To Make Google Pay News Outlets. The Company Cut a Deal that Includes Funding AI</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/news/2024/08/22/california-tried-to-make-google-pay-news-outlets-the-company-cut-a-deal-that-includes-funding-ai</link> <description>State lawmakers give up on bills to force tech companies to pay media outlets for using news. Instead, they agree with Google on a program to help local newsrooms and to explore artificial intelligence</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>State lawmakers give up on bills to force tech companies to pay media outlets for using news. Instead, they agree with Google on a program to help local newsrooms and to explore artificial intelligence</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/081524_Suspense-File_FG_CM_38_16x9_reduced-1682x946.jpg" alt="Chair of the Appropriations Committee, Buffy Wicks, speaks during the Suspense File hearing in the Capitol Annex Swing Space in Sacramento on Aug. 15, 2024." width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Chair of the Appropriations Committee, Buffy Wicks, speaks during the Suspense File hearing in the Capitol Annex Swing Space in Sacramento on Aug. 15, 2024. Photo by Fred Greaves for CalMatters </figcaption> </figure> </div> California lawmakers are abandoning an ambitious proposal to force Google to pay news companies for using their content, opting instead for a deal in which the tech giant has agreed to pay $172 million to support local media outlets and start an artificial intelligence program. <a href="https://a14.asmdc.org/press-releases/20240821-assemblymember-wicks-secures-agreement-state-major-tech-companies-support">The first-in-the-nation agreement</a>, announced today, promises $175 million for local journalism across California over the next five years, but represents a significant departure from the bill pushed by news publishers and media employee unions earlier this year.  Instead of Google and Meta being forced to negotiate usage fees with news outlets directly, Google would deposit $55 million over five years into a new fund administered by UC Berkeley to be distributed to local newsrooms — and the state would provide $70 million over five years. Google would also continue paying $10 million each year in existing grants to newsrooms. The Legislature and the governor would still need to approve the state money each year; the source isn’t specified yet. Google would also contribute $12.5 million each year toward an artificial intelligence “accelerator” program, raising labor advocates’ anxieties about the threat of job losses.  Publishers who initially pushed for the proposal forcing Google to pay them said the deal was still a win. The UC Berkeley fund will be overseen by news industry groups; the money will be distributed according to the number of journalists employed at each publication, with some  reserved for smaller or ethnic media outlets. “This is a first step toward what we hope will become a comprehensive program to sustain local news in the long term, and we will push to see it grow in future years,” Julie Makinen, board chairperson of the California News Publishers Association, said in a statement. In an interview, Makinen said that the deal was “not what we had hoped for when set out, but it is a start and it will begin to provide some help to newsrooms across the state.” “Sometimes, the political realities, they are what they are,” she said. “And there’s many of them in this state and in this election year.” Unions representing media workers accused the news companies and lawmakers of settling for too little.  Senate Democratic leader <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/legislators/mike-mcguire-93">Mike McGuire, whose chamber was earlier this year considering a bill “to hold Big Tech companies accountable for the profits they make off” linking to news articles,</a> also raised concerns. In a statement, he said the deal “lacks sufficient funding for newspapers and local media, and doesn’t fully address the inequities facing the industry.”  The agreement replaces two bills lawmakers had pursued the last two years as they tried to secure a cut of tech money to prop up California’s struggling local news industry. Following a nationwide trend, media companies have hemorrhaged jobs over the past two decades as advertisers fled print media for the internet and technological advancements reshaped how readers consume news. The state has <a href="https://www.axios.com/local/san-diego/2023/12/19/local-news-shrinking-california-san-diego">lost one-third</a> of its newspapers since 2005 in a trend experts say worsens civic engagement, polarization and misinformation. To try to keep their readers, publications increasingly rely on social media and online search. Google controls the lion’s share of search in a way the U.S. Justice Department and one federal judge have said <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/05/technology/google-antitrust-ruling.html">violates antitrust law</a>. The proposals to impose fees on Google’s use of news content in its search results prompted a flurry of tech company lobbying. In the past 18 months, for instance, Google spent more than $2.1 million lobbying lawmakers against those bills and others — more than triple what it spent in the same time period two years earlier, according to a CalMatters review. The first bill, introduced in February 2023 by Oakland Democratic Assemblymember <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/legislators/buffy-wicks-165044">Buffy Wicks</a>, would <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/bills/ca_202320240ab886">have required platforms such as Google and Meta</a> to either pay a fee or negotiate with news outlets for using their news content.  It was sponsored by the news publishers association, whose members include major newspapers including the San Francisco Chronicle and the Los Angeles Times. (CalMatters is also a member.) The bill passed the Assembly last year, but Wicks paused it to try to bridge a split among media companies over how the money would be divvied up.  Australia and Canada both passed similar measures in recent years — but the political headwinds were different in the tech companies’ home state.  Google has argued the bill would unfairly force it to pay for sending free traffic to news sites, and disadvantage smaller sites. In a legislative hearing in June, the company’s vice president of global news partnerships, Jaffer Zaidi, called the proposal “profoundly unconstitutional and problematic” since it could compel platforms to show content that they were forced to pay for. The second bill, introduced this February by Orinda Democratic Sen. <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/legislators/steven-glazer-165414">Steve Glazer</a>, would have <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/bills/ca_202320240sb1327">imposed a fee on major tech platforms</a> to provide news outlets a tax credit to employ local journalists.  In response to the Wicks bill, Google <a href="https://www.kqed.org/news/11983333/why-is-google-removing-news-links-for-some-californians">temporarily removed links to California news websites</a> from its search results and in response to the Glazer bill, Google said it might <a href="https://www.axios.com/2024/05/21/google-news-initiative-journalism-funding-california">stop funding nonprofit newsrooms nationwide</a>. At the time, McGuire <a href="https://x.com/ilike_mike/status/1778935352604110884">called the threats</a> “an abuse of power.”   Glazer shelved<a href="https://calmatters.org/newsletter/california-border-migrants-video/#wm-story-1"> his bill in May</a>, after failing to scrounge up the two-thirds majority he needed, and said he would focus on trying to improve the Wicks bill.  Negotiations ramped up over the summer.  Tech companies doubled down on threats to stop linking to news sites in California if Wicks’ bill passed, and publishers had an incentive to support an agreement that would give them the money quicker. In Canada, the government has estimated Google is paying $73 million a year to news outlets under its new journalism industry law, but proponents of California’s deal say the money has been slow to be distributed.  Another factor: Some proponents said it was unlikely Gov. Gavin Newsom, who pledged no tax increases this year, would sign Wicks’ bill, which could be seen as a tax on tech companies. Newsom in a press release today praised the deal, though his spokesperson Alex Stack on Tuesday denied the governor was involved or had taken a position on the bill. “This agreement represents a major breakthrough in ensuring the survival of newsrooms and bolstering local journalism across California — leveraging substantial tech industry resources without imposing new taxes on Californians,” Newsom said in a statement.  By committing to pay into the new UC Berkeley fund, tech companies succeeded in killing the bill they opposed while appeasing both legacy print media and some digital-only news outlets with five years of support. The agreement is similar to a deal Google cut in France more than a decade ago, creating a “digital publishing innovation fund” when publishers there pushed for regulations.  “This public-private partnership builds on our long history of working with journalism and the local news ecosystem in our home state,” Kent Walker, an executive at Google’s parent company Alphabet, said in the press release announcing the agreement.  Wicks called it “a cross-sector commitment to supporting a free and vibrant press.” In contrast, Glazer said it was “completely inadequate and massively short” of what Google is paying in Canada, and “seriously undercuts our work toward a long-term solution to rescue independent journalism.” The Media Guild of the West, which represents reporters in Southern California, slammed the agreement and accused publishers and lawmakers of folding to Google’s threats.  “Google won, a monopoly won,” said Matt Pearce, the group’s president. “This is dramatically worse than what Australia and Canada got … I don’t know of any journalist that asked for this.” The guild said it was particularly concerned the deal involved a program promoting artificial intelligence technology, which it saw as a concession to the tech industry that could result in a further loss of reporting jobs. The Pacific Media Workers Guild, which represents journalists in Northern California, also opposes the deal. The AI program appears to only be partly related to journalism: In its announcement, Wicks’ office said the program will give businesses, nonprofits and researchers “financial resources and other support to experiment with AI to assist them in their work” addressing challenges such as environmental issues and racial inequities. OpenAI will contribute tech services, said former lawmaker Bob Hertzberg, who helped negotiate the deal, and proponents expect other tech companies to join in. The AI accelerator would also create “new tools to help journalists access and analyze public information.” Makinen, of the news publishers association, said more details of the program “need to be made public as soon as possible,” and said she wants to see “more of those resources directed toward publishers.” Others, including an association of mostly smaller, digital news outlets, said the threat of tech platforms refusing to link to news articles would have been devastating.  Chris Krewson, president of Local Independent Online News Publishers, <a href="https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2024-07-24/california-is-trying-to-pressure-big-tech-to-pay-for-news-what-can-we-learn-from-australia-and-canada">pointed to Canada</a>, where Facebook no longer links to Canadian media in response to the new law there. That caused readership and ad revenue to plummet for small news outlets, Krewson said.  The organization’s major funders include Google and Meta; CalMatters CEO Neil Chase, an association board member, last weekend urged member publications to support the deal.  “I just don’t know that this industry should be in the position of saying no to any help it can get,” Krewson said. “And I don’t think it makes us more or less reliant (on tech platforms) than we already have been.” CalMatters CEO Neil Chase has been involved in the deal as a board member for Local Independent Online News Publishers. His views do not necessarily reflect those of the organization, newsroom or its staff. The CalMatters staff is represented by the Pacific Media Workers Guild, which is separate from the Media Guild of the West and says it has not been involved. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79736</guid> <pubDate>Thu, 22 Aug 2024 13:55:58 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator> Jeanne Kuang </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/081524_Suspense-File_FG_CM_38_16x9_reduced.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/news/2024/08/22/california-tried-to-make-google-pay-news-outlets-the-company-cut-a-deal-that-includes-funding-ai'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>How to Sign Up for Local Emergency Alerts Before Natural Disasters Strike</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/the-breakdown/2024/08/30/local-emergency-alerts-sign-up</link> <description>We know early warning systems save lives. Give yourself extra time when disasters come your way</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>We know early warning systems save lives. Give yourself extra time when disasters come your way</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-1717259973_reduced-1682x946.jpg" alt="A national alert test displayed on a cellphone." width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Joe Raedle/Getty Images </figcaption> </figure> </div> Natural disasters <a href="https://www.fema.gov/disaster/how-declared">have affected</a> nearly <a href="https://www.forbes.com/advisor/homeowners-insurance/counties-most-at-risk-for-natural-disasters/">90 percent of U.S. counties</a> since 2013, and while many households know about preparing emergency kits, a <a href="https://community.fema.gov/PreparednessConnect/s/article/Results-from-the-2023-National-Household-Survey-on-Disaster-Preparedness">recent FEMA survey</a> found a large drop in how many people are signed up to receive emergency alerts and warnings.  Early warning systems <a href="https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/early-warnings-for-all#:~:text=Early%20warning%20systems%20have%20proven,$3%20to%20$16%20billion%20annually">save lives during disasters</a>. To ensure you can receive these warnings via your phone, text, or email, we recommend turning on your phone’s alerts and signing up for your local government’s emergency alert system. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">Jump to Section</h3> <a href="#on-iphones" data-type="internal" data-id="#on-iphones">Turn On Your iPhone’s Wireless Emergency Alerts</a> <a href="#on-androids">Turn On Your Android’s Wireless Emergency Alerts</a> <a href="#how-to-find-local-alerts">How to Find Local Alerts</a> </aside> <h2>Turn On Your Phone’s Wireless Emergency Alerts</h2> Wireless Emergency Alerts (<a href="https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/wireless-emergency-alerts-wea">WEAs</a>) are one way authorities spread information to the community during an emergency. Most mobile phones are <a href="https://www.verizon.com/support/wireless-emergency-alerts-compatible-devices/">WEA-capable devices</a>, and alerts are typically enabled by default. But if you’ve ever received an alert or test alert, there’s a chance you may have disabled them after hearing their signature alarm: an insistent and loud blare, accompanied by vibrations, that goes off on every phone in your vicinity. You can turn off some of the alerts you don’t want, while receiving the ones you do, so it’s worth checking your phone’s settings. WEAs use cell towers to send notifications to all WEA-capable mobile phones within a specified target area, meaning you receive alerts for your current location, not your home address. WEAs may also occasionally reach some community members <a href="https://www.fema.gov/emergency-managers/practitioners/integrated-public-alert-warning-system/public/wireless-emergency-alerts/geographic-accuracy-wea">outside the target area</a>, depending on the phones’ technology. Here’s how to make sure your phone can receive WEAs. <h3>On iPhones</h3> <figure> <figcaption>Step 1</figcaption> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/emergency-alert-iphone-1-720x1201.png" alt="Screenshot of iPhone Settings" width="720" width="1201"> </figure> <figure> <figcaption>Step 2</figcaption> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/emergency-alert-iphone-2-720x1201.png" alt="Screenshot of Notifications" width="720" width="1201"> </figure> <figure> <figcaption>Steps 3–5</figcaption> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/emergency-alert-iphone-3-5-720x1201.png" alt="Screenshot of Government Alerts" width="720" width="1201"> </figure> <figure> <figcaption>Steps 6–7</figcaption> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/emergency-alert-iphone-6-720x1201.png" alt="Screenshot of Emergency Alerts" width="720" width="1201"> </figure> <ol > <li>Navigate to iPhone Settings.</li> <li>Select Notifications.</li> <li>Scroll to the bottom of the Notifications section to GOVERNMENT ALERTS.</li> <li>Next to Public Safety Alerts, toggle the button on (it turns green). These alerts convey “<a href="https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/wireless-emergency-alerts-wea">recommendations</a> for saving lives and property.”</li> <li>Select Emergency Alerts.</li> <li>On the following screen, ensure that Emergency Alerts are toggled on. </li> <li>The Local Awareness option improves the timeliness and accuracy of emergency alerts in the United States, <a href="https://support.apple.com/en-us/102516">according to Apple</a>. Toggle to enable or disable.</li> </ul> </ol> Here’s <a href="https://support.apple.com/en-us/102516">Apple’s page</a> on how to turn on emergency alerts. <h3>On Androids</h3> <figure> <figcaption>Step 1</figcaption> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/emergency-alert-android-1-720x1201.png" alt="Screenshot of Android Settings" width="720" width="1201"> </figure> <figure> <figcaption>Step 2</figcaption> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/emergency-alert-android-2-720x1201.png" alt="Screenshot of Settings menu showing Safety & emergency option" width="720" width="1201"> </figure> <figure> <figcaption>Step 3</figcaption> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/emergency-alert-android-3-720x1201.png" alt="Screenshot of Safety & emergency settings" width="720" width="1201"> </figure> <figure> <figcaption>Steps 4–6</figcaption> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/emergency-alert-android-4-6-720x1201.png" alt="Screenshot of Wireless Emergency Alerts" width="720" width="1201"> </figure> <ol > <li>Navigate to Android Settings.</li> <li>Scroll down and select Safety & emergency. </li> <li>Select Wireless emergency alerts at the bottom of the screen.</li> <li>On the following screen, ensure that Allow alerts is toggled on. </li> <li>Toggle Extreme threats and Severe threats to enable or disable alerts for threats to life and property.</li> <li>Toggle Public safety messages to enable or disable alerts with recommended actions to save lives or property.</li> </ul> </ol> You can also visit <a href="https://support.google.com/android/answer/9319337?hl=en#zippy=">this “Android Help” page</a> and select the blue “Control emergency broadcast notifications” option for instructions on how to manage WEA alert settings on Android.  <h2>Local Text or Email Alerts</h2> Authorities may not always use WEAs to circulate information, so it’s also important to enroll in your local government’s emergency alert system. During the deadly 2018 Camp Fire in California, authorities issued evacuation orders through Butte County’s emergency alerts, door-knocking, vehicle-mounted speakers, and social media posts—but did not send any WEAs. At the time, fewer than 40 percent of residents in <a href="https://calmatters.org/environment/2019/10/paradise-california-camp-fire-anniversary-cleanup/">Paradise, one of the towns destroyed in the fire</a>, had signed up for the county’s alerts, according to a <a href="https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/TechnicalNotes/NIST.TN.2252.pdf">2023 report</a>. Although some county alert systems automatically enroll landline numbers, you likely need to opt in to receive notifications on a mobile device or via email. There is no standardized emergency alert system across the United States; the enrollment process and your notification system’s features differ based on where you live. Different governments’ mass notification systems may include different types of alerts. Some only notify you in extreme situations, such as disaster evacuations, while others may also send alerts for missing persons or police activity. Note what kind of alerts your local system offers before signing up, and keep in mind you can often choose what type of alerts you’d like to receive.   Users will typically be asked to provide their mobile number, email, and street address. Many emergency alert systems have the option to register multiple street addresses, allowing you to keep tabs on other significant locations like your workplace or kids’ schools. Some also allow you to customize whether you’d like to receive alerts via phone call, text message, or email, and offer language and accessibility options. If customization options are not offered during initial enrollment, you may be able to log in after enrolling to change your settings and add additional information.  Emergency alert systems are often run through third-parties. Common ones include OnSolve CodeRED, Everbridge, Rave Mobile Safety’s Smart 911, and Genasys. If your local government uses a third-party system, you will generally be directed to that company’s website to enroll. Once you receive an emergency alert (or a signup confirmation), we recommend that you save the number to your Contacts and <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2019/9/26/20883331/iphone-do-not-disturb-mode-exceptions-how-to">exclude it from being blocked</a> when using your cell phone’s Do Not Disturb features.Even if you’ve signed up for alerts previously, it’s worth checking to make sure you’re still registered with your county. Some <a href="https://www.shastacounty.gov/community/page/alertshasta-shasta-countys-new-public-warning-system">governments</a> may have <a href="https://humboldtgov.org/2014/Emergency-Notifications">transitioned</a> to new systems and might not have migrated residents’ information. <h3>How to Find Local Alerts</h3> Search online for the name of your county and the phrase “emergency alerts.” This will often bring up your local government’s emergency alerts information page with instructions on how to enroll. For example, <a href="https://duckduckgo.com/?q=los+angeles+county+emergency+alerts">a search for “Los Angeles County emergency alerts”</a> returns the <a href="https://ready.lacounty.gov/alerts/">Alert LA County</a> page with sign-up links as the top result. Depending on where you live, an internet search may yield results for multiple notification systems. Look for alerts at the county level and make sure you register specifically for emergency alerts, as some governments offer community-based alerts that are not meant to be primary emergency alert systems. Some cities also offer separate emergency notification systems. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">If You Live in California...</h3> We looked up every California county’s alert system for you. <a href="https://calmatters.org/environment/2024/08/california-emergency-alerts/">Find your options on CalMatters.</a> </aside> If a direct search doesn’t work, you can also hunt around your state or county’s office of emergency management’s website (sometimes called the office of emergency services or something similar), for an emergency alerts information page or an emergency preparedness page with a link to sign up for notifications. If you can’t find alert information in either of these places, try the main county website, the county sheriff’s office, or the fire department.  Some states compile information from their cities’ and counties’ alerting systems into a single tool or website. For example, these <a href="https://www.listoscalifornia.org/alerts/">California</a>, <a href="https://dhsem.colorado.gov/emergencyalert">Colorado</a>, and <a href="https://oralert.gov">Oregon</a> pages provide users with links to information and sign-up pages for every county in their state. Although this provides a good starting point, it’s worth cross-referencing this information with independent searches of your local government’s websites, as these tools sometimes link to outdated information or to notification systems that are not used as primary emergency alerts. When in doubt, get in touch with your local government to check that you’re signing up for the right alerts. <hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/> Signing up for emergency alerts is a crucial first step in preparing for a natural disaster, but it’s not the last. Alerts delivered via phone or email rely on some combination of phone service, internet, and power, all of which could go down during a natural disaster. Government agencies, however, have also used non-electronic emergency alerts for a long time, including door-to-door knocking or vehicle-mounted speakers. But you may find yourself in a position where you need to evacuate an area before an official order has even been issued. So don’t forget to develop a comprehensive <a href="https://www.ready.gov/plan">disaster plan</a> and review it with your household. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79779</guid> <pubDate>Fri, 30 Aug 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Natasha Uzcátegui-Liggett </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-1717259973_reduced.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/the-breakdown/2024/08/30/local-emergency-alerts-sign-up'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>California Companies Wrote Their Own Gig Worker Law. Now No One Is Enforcing It</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/working-for-an-algorithm/2024/09/04/california-companies-wrote-their-own-gig-worker-law-now-no-one-is-enforcing-it</link> <description>Prop. 22 promised improved pay and benefits for California gig workers. But when companies fail to deliver, the state isn’t doing much to help push back</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>Prop. 22 promised improved pay and benefits for California gig workers. But when companies fail to deliver, the state isn’t doing much to help push back</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/052124_Prop-22_JY_CM_12-1682x946.jpg" alt="A crowd of protesters hold Prop. 22 signs with their mouths open and fists in the air. One prominent sign reads, "Unconstitutional Prop 22, Bad for Workers, Bad for the Economy, Bad for California."" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Ride-share drivers of the California Gig Workers Union hold a rally outside of the Supreme Court of California to protest Prop. 22 in San Francisco on May 21, 2024. The state Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Prop. 22, a ballot initiative that allows ride-share companies, such as Uber and Lyft, to classify drivers as independent contractors. Juliana Yamada for CalMatters </figcaption> </figure> </div> Nearly four years after California voters approved better wages and health benefits for  ride-hailing drivers and delivery workers, no one is actually ensuring they are provided, according to state agencies, interviews with workers and a review of wage claims filed with the state. Voters mandated the benefits in November 2020 when they approved <a href="https://calmatters.org/tag/proposition-22/">Proposition 22</a>. The ballot initiative was backed by gig-work companies that wanted to keep their workers classified as independent contractors and were resisting a <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/06/ab-5-california-uber/">2019 state law</a> that would have considered them employees. Prop. 22 stipulated that gig workers would remain independent contractors but be treated better. The state Industrial Relations Department, which handles wage claims, now tells CalMatters it does not have jurisdiction to resolve those related to Prop. 22, citing a <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/07/prop-22-california-gig-work-law-upheld/">July 25 California Supreme Court ruling</a> that upheld the law and therefore maintains that gig workers are not employees. That effectively passes enforcement responsibility on to the state attorney general, whose office was noncommittal when asked about its plans, saying that it does not adjudicate individual claims but does prosecute companies that systematically violate the law. The lack of enforcement leaves in limbo workers who in many cases have already been waiting for months or years for the state to resolve their complaints. Workers have filed 54 claims related to Prop. 22 since it went into effect in December 2020. At least 32 of them are unresolved, state records obtained by CalMatters show, although at least two of those are due to workers not following through.  Of the unresolved claims, one goes back to 2021, several are from 2022 and 2023, and about half are from this year, through May. Emails included with the claims show that the Industrial Relations Department told one worker it was severely understaffed, and seven others, starting in 2022, that it did not have jurisdiction to help them since they were independent contractors rather than employees. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft"><blockquote>It’s not helpful if it’s not enforced or applied.<cite>Laura Robinson, ride-hailing worker</cite></blockquote></figure> Although the number of claims filed with the state represent just a fraction of the more than 1 million gig workers in California, they give a glimpse into what happens when workers turn to the state for help instead of the companies that backed Prop. 22.  Workers say in the claims, and in interviews with CalMatters, that companies such as Uber, Lyft and Instacart failed to provide higher wages and health care stipends under the law, and that the companies’ representatives sometimes act confused or take a long time to handle their requests for Prop. 22 benefits. The gig companies have touted the law as something that has boosted pay and benefits, and have said it has helped gig workers hang on to work they can do whenever they want. Laura Robinson is among the workers who have had to aggressively pursue what they believe they’re owed under the law. For the past year, she has filed claims with the state and fought two different gig-work companies for different benefits promised under Prop. 22.  She was making a delivery for Instacart a year ago, she said, when a driver making a U-turn hit her, totaling her car. Now, she said, she has lingering back pain, and has only been able to make a total of a few deliveries over the past several months. Robinson, who lives in Irvine, tried to get Instacart to retroactively provide her with occupational accident insurance as required under Prop. 22.  When she first contacted Instacart about the collision, “four or five different (representatives) told me on chat ‘we don’t provide insurance,’ but I told them this is California,” Robinson said. “Finally someone said ‘oh yeah, I know what you’re talking about.’ ” Robinson had some difficulties documenting the accident, because, she said, the responding Torrance Police Department officer rode away on his motorcycle without writing a report. But after about seven months, she finally heard back from Zurich, Instacart’s insurance provider. She received a lump sum, and monthly payments for the time that she has been largely unable to work, according to bank statements and emails from Zurich to her, which she shared with CalMatters.  Instacart spokesperson Charlotte Healow said all the company’s shopper support agents should know about “shopper injury protection” and that there is information in the app about how to go about filing claims. But Robinson showed CalMatters several screenshots of her chats with support agents who either thought she was asking about health insurance or who told her someone would email her back about her situation — which eventually happened, though it took a few tries. Robinson said she had also struggled to get a smaller gig platform, food delivery app Curri, to comply with the law. Under Prop. 22, ride-hailing and delivery gig companies are supposed to pay her 120% of minimum wage for the time she spends driving, making up for any shortfall in the pay she receives, but Curri had not done so, she said. Not knowing where to turn, she asked a few different state agencies for help, including the attorney general’s office. She even lodged a complaint with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s National Consumer Complaint Database. After several months, the Industrial Relations Department scheduled a hearing for her case for Aug. 29. Last week, the department told her the company decided to settle and pay her what it owed, according to emails and a release she signed that she shared with CalMatters. Curri’s marketing director referred CalMatters to the company’s legal department, which did not return three emailed requests for comment. Robinson saw the upside of Prop. 22 after it passed. She liked being able to continue setting her own hours and saw a bump in her earnings delivering for Grubhub due to the law. But she is now frustrated about how tough it was to figure out who’s supposed to be upholding it.  “It’s not helpful if it’s not enforced or applied,” she said. Robinson said the deputy labor commissioner she was in touch with throughout the process of pursuing her claim against Curri told her last week that because Prop. 22 was upheld by the state Supreme Court — effectively ensuring gig workers cannot be considered employees — the department would no longer be handling similar cases because it does not have jurisdiction over independent contractors. <h2>What gig workers are complaining about </h2> The Prop. 22-related wage claims reviewed by CalMatters were part of a larger set of nearly 200 claims that gig workers filed with the Industrial Relations Department since the law took effect in December 2020. Citing the California Public Records Act, CalMatters sought all wage claims in that timeframe involving gig companies, but the state did not provide any claims against DoorDash, which is one of the biggest of the app-based gig companies. A department spokesperson could not explain why. Most of the claimants sought delayed or unpaid wages, including adjustments owed under Prop. 22. Others sought health care stipends required under the gig-work law, and one driver said he sought occupational accident insurance but did not receive it.   The claims also shed light on the mechanics of how app companies are allegedly withholding wages. In them, some gig workers claimed that they were deactivated — kicked off or fired by the app — before receiving all their wages.  The records also indicate the state had trouble holding app companies to account in a timely fashion. In emails about the claims, some workers frequently asked for updates about their cases and complained about limited communications from the state. This prompted one supervisor in the Industrial Relations Department’s San Francisco office to <a href="https://calmatters.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/CM-1006930-PRA-HQ-46848.pdf">respond by email</a> on May 30, 2024, seemingly noting that gig workers’ complaints were just a fraction of the array of worker complaints the state fields: “I am working with 40% staff shortage. There are over 3,000 cases, most of which are older than yours, and only seven people (total) to handle them.” The department did not respond to requests for comment on whether this shortfall persists. Monetary wage claims ranged from about $2 to nearly $420,000. Most — 54% —  were against ride-hailing and delivery giant Uber and 25% were against its rides competitor Lyft. There were 17 claims against grocery-delivery app maker Instacart, seven against food-delivery platform Grubhub, four against Target-owned delivery service Shipt and three against UPS-owned delivery service Roadie.  <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignright"><blockquote>Although the Attorney General does not represent individual workers or adjudicate individual complaints…(he) brings lawsuits to hold accountable companies that systematically break the law, for example through widespread violations of wage and hour standards.<cite>California Attorney General’s office</cite></blockquote></figure> The Industrial Relations Department has long tried to resolve gig workers’ wage disputes. The labor commissioner, who heads the department’s Labor Standards Enforcement Division, still has pending <a href="https://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/Lawsuits-Uber-Lyft.html">wage-theft lawsuits</a> against Uber and Lyft that it filed in 2020 on behalf of about 5,000 workers with wage claims going back to 2017. Those cases predate Prop. 22, originating during a period when gig workers were misclassified and should have been considered employees under California law, the labor commissioner argues in the wage-theft suits. After Prop. 22 passed, opponents challenged it and the case ended up before the California Supreme Court, which upheld the law in July, effectively affirming that drivers are independent contractors, not employees. A department spokesperson, Peter Melton, said the ruling means the department can no longer handle claims about missing wage adjustments under the earnings guarantee, unpaid health care stipends or other aspects of the law.  Department representatives made similar statements to workers even before Prop. 22 was upheld, the claims records show. An email response, dated March 26, 2024, from the department to an Uber driver <a href="https://calmatters.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/CM-1007106-PRA-HQ-46848.pdf">stated</a>: “The Division of Labor Standards Enforcement enforces employment law. We cannot enforce Prop 22 earnings because they aren’t ‘wages’ earned by ‘employees’.” This echoes the position lawyers for Uber and Lyft took in some of the records when responding to wage claims. They asked the state to dismiss such claims, writing in <a href="https://calmatters.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/CM-1003300-PRA-HQ-46848.pdf">one email</a>: “As of December 16, 2020, drivers using Lyft’s platform are considered independent contractors by statute and, thus, cannot seek relief under the Labor Code.” Now that the department has disavowed responsibility for Prop. 22 claims, the question remains: Who will enforce the law? Scott Kronland, the attorney for Service Employees International Union California who unsuccessfully argued before the state Supreme Court that it should throw out Prop. 22, told CalMatters: “I’ve also heard from drivers that they’re not getting the things they’re promised by Prop. 22.” Kronland said their recourse, after the ruling, is to press local prosecutors or the attorney general, who have the ability to hold companies liable for unlawful business practices under the state’s Unfair Competition Law. Still, he said “enforcement is something the Legislature could clarify.” In an unsigned email response to CalMatters’ questions after the state Supreme Court decision, including whether it planned to pursue Prop.-22-related cases against gig-work companies, the attorney general’s office said gig workers can submit complaints at <a href="http://oag.ca.gov/report">oag.ca.gov/report</a>. The email added: “Although the Attorney General does not represent individual workers or adjudicate individual complaints by holding administrative hearings like (the Department of Industrial Relations), DOJ brings lawsuits to hold accountable companies that systematically break the law, for example through widespread violations of wage and hour standards. Reports or complaints of employer misconduct are an important part of our work.” When CalMatters previously asked the attorney general’s office for copies of any wage complaints it had received from gig workers thus far, a spokesperson responded that the office was representing the state in its effort to defend <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/05/prop-22-oral-arguments/">Prop. 22 before the California Supreme Court</a> — and referred CalMatters back to the Industrial Relations Department. <h2>What gig companies share about Prop. 22’s impact</h2> Gig companies have said that, due in part to the initiative’s earnings guarantee, workers now make more than $30 an hour. But a May study by the UC Berkeley Labor Center found that, for California ride-hailing drivers, average earnings after expenses, not including tips, is about $7.12 an hour, and for delivery workers, $5.93. With tips, drivers’ average hourly earnings are $9.09 an hour, and $13.62 for delivery workers, the study found.  To better understand the impact of Prop. 22, CalMatters asked each of the four largest gig companies — Uber, Lyft, DoorDash and Instacart — the following:  <ul> <li>How much they have spent on delivering on each of Prop. 22’s four main promises (120% of minimum wage earnings guarantee, health care stipends, occupational accident insurance, accidental death insurance)</li> <li>How many gig workers have received each of the promised benefits. </li> <li>Whether they have passed on costs to consumers, and if so, where they account for those customer fees in their public financial filings. </li> <li>How they handle complaints or issues related to their promises.</li> </ul> </ul> Lyft said 85% of California Lyft drivers who have driven for the company since Prop. 22 went into effect have received at least one wage “top up” — the additional money drivers receive under the earnings guarantee — through the end of the fourth quarter of 2023, though spokesperson Shadawn Reddick-Smith would not provide specific numbers of Lyft drivers in the state. None of the other companies would give any information on their delivery of the wage guarantee. Instacart spokesperson Healow said the company has paid out about $40 million in health care subsidies to its delivery workers, which she said number in the tens of thousands in the state. She also said about 11% of California shoppers have become eligible for a health care stipend since Prop. 22 took effect, and that 28% of those eligible shoppers have redeemed their subsidy.  <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-1228964842-1280x869.jpg" alt="Photograph of a Black woman standing outside her car with her cell phone and arms raised" width="1280" height="869"> <figcaption> App based gig workers held a driving demonstration in Los Angeles urging voters to vote no on Proposition 22<div style="margin-top: 5px;">Al Seib / Los Angeles Times</div></figcaption></figure> To qualify for the health care stipends, workers must work at least 15 hours a week each quarter, and be enrolled in health insurance that is not provided by an employer or the government. Because the gig companies won’t share how many workers have received the stipends, CalMatters asked the state health insurance exchange, Covered California, if it had data that might help shed some light. Seven percent of the 1.6 million people who used Covered California reported doing gig work in a 2023 survey, said a spokesperson for the exchange, Jagdip Dhillon. DoorDash spokesperson Parker Dorrough said that just 11% of eligible couriers used the health care stipend in the fourth quarter of 2023 but that 80% of DoorDash’s delivery workers had health care coverage through another source, such as their full-time job or spouse. None of the other companies would give any information on their delivery of the stipend. Lyft’s Reddick-Smith said 80% of California Lyft drivers already have health care coverage, including 13% who bought their own coverage (this second group is the set of drivers who qualified for the stipend). None of the four companies provided the numbers of workers who have used occupational accident or accidental death insurance. None of the companies would disclose how they account for the fees they charge customers for Prop. 22 expenses, nor are the fees included in their publicly available financial filings. Instacart said it does not charge customers for expenses associated with Prop. 22. Lyft said its per-ride service fee includes a 75-cent “California Driver Benefits Fee.” Uber charges customers a “CA Driver Benefits” fee for each ride and delivery in the state and spokesperson Zahid Arab said the company has “invested more than we collected in fees.” Uber published a blog post after CalMatters’ questions, saying it has “invested” more than $1 billion in Prop. 22 benefits. Arab would not break down these benefits further.  As for complaints related to the promises, each of the companies said workers should contact support agents, whom they can usually get in touch with in the app; an Instacart spokesperson said workers can make some claims directly in the company’s app. <h2>Seeing little from Prop. 22</h2> Ride-hailing driver Sergio Avedian last year helped raise public awareness of the lack of Prop. 22 enforcement. Specifically, he homed in on one narrow issue: Under the law, gig-work companies were supposed to adjust for inflation each year the reimbursement they pay to drivers for mileage. Avedian said no such adjustment had taken place for two consecutive years. And as a podcaster and contributor to  the Rideshare Guy, a popular gig-work blog, he had a high profile. Avedian and a fellow eagle-eyed driver started pestering the state’s treasurer’s office, which had not published the adjusted rates as stipulated under Prop 22. The office eventually did so and, the Los Angeles Times reported, put the state’s gig workers <a href="https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2023-06-01/column-uber-david-and-goliath">on track to get back pay for the mileage expenses</a> — pay potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars.  Now, a year later, Avedian is curious about gig-company math again. He has asked Uber some of the same questions CalMatters did — including how the company accounts for the driver-benefits fee it adds on to each ride or delivery. The company’s response to him was similar — it provided few specifics. Besides his concern about the issue as a driver, Avedian said “as a consumer who is paying into the Prop. 22 fund on every trip or delivery, I would like to know the accounting of where my money is going.” <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignright"><blockquote>We’re not completely independent contractors. We’re not employees. We’re sort of a hybrid model of theirs. We’re pretty much nobody.<cite>Yasha Timenovich, ride-hailing driver</cite></blockquote></figure> When the gig companies were campaigning for Prop. 22, they implored voters to “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7QJLgdQaf4">help create a better path forward for drivers</a>.”  But Avedian and other gig workers in California say their paths have not changed much. Many still complain about low wages, little transparency from the companies and lack of worker protections. Yasha Timenovich said he has worked as a ride-hailing driver for a decade, first with Uber, now with Lyft. “I work 12, 13, 14 hours a day,” said Timenovich, who drives in the Los Angeles area. “But the time I sit and wait at LAX is not accounted for.” He said he has to work long hours to try to make sure he has enough earnings. “We’re not completely independent contractors. We’re not employees. We’re sort of a hybrid model of theirs. We’re pretty much nobody.” He also said he must obtain health insurance through Medi-Cal, California’s health care coverage for low-income residents — which in turn means he doesn’t qualify for the health care stipend. He said every driver he knows “is on Medi-Cal because they can’t afford health insurance. I don’t know anyone who has (the stipend).” Many drivers voted for Prop. 22, he said. But “what we were told was a lie.” ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79867</guid> <pubDate>Wed, 04 Sep 2024 08:35:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Levi Sumagaysay </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/08/052124_Prop-22_JY_CM_12.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/working-for-an-algorithm/2024/09/04/california-companies-wrote-their-own-gig-worker-law-now-no-one-is-enforcing-it'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>How I’m Trying to Use Generative AI as a Journalism Engineer — Ethically</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/09/07/how-im-trying-to-use-generative-ai-as-a-journalism-engineer-ethically</link> <description>Is it possible?</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>Is it possible?</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/hello-world-ai-ethics-olga-aleksandrova-1682x946.jpg" alt="Illustration of an iceberg with a small figure standing at the top, gazing downward; the top half is in front of a ChatGPT input form; the bottom half is a collage featuring imagery of power plants, copyright symbols, a surveillance map, people crying, and downward arrows" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Olga Aleksandrova </figcaption> </figure> </div> Hello, readers! I’m Tomas Apodaca, a journalism engineer at The Markup and CalMatters. It’s my job to write software and analyze data and algorithms in service of our investigative journalism.  In the year since I joined The Markup, I’ve been thinking about how artificial intelligence can be used in the newsroom—or really, whether generative AI in particular can be ethically used in the newsroom at all. The journalism industry’s relationship with AI is complicated. News organizations like the Associated Press have <a href="https://apnews.com/article/openai-chatgpt-associated-press-ap-f86f84c5bcc2f3b98074b38521f5f75a">licensed</a> their content to OpenAI, while newsrooms like the New York Times are <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/27/business/media/new-york-times-open-ai-microsoft-lawsuit.html">suing</a> OpenAI. Just last week, <a href="https://themarkup.org/news/2024/08/22/california-tried-to-make-google-pay-news-outlets-the-company-cut-a-deal-that-includes-funding-ai">California lawmakers scrapped a proposal</a> that would’ve forced Google to pay news organizations for using their journalism, in favor of a deal that includes some funding for journalism, and specifically, funding for a “<a href="https://a14.asmdc.org/press-releases/20240821-assemblymember-wicks-secures-agreement-state-major-tech-companies-support">National AI Accelerator</a>.” I’m an AI skeptic, in part because I learned about generative AI in 2021 from <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3442188.3445922">a paper that questioned</a> whether the benefits of ever-larger language models were worth their costs. Since then, I’ve learned so much more about the ethical and environmental toll that AI takes: <ul> <li>Models produce text that is untethered from reality, a phenomenon known as <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/15/24154808/ai-chatgpt-google-gemini-microsoft-copilot-hallucination-wrong">“hallucinating”</a></li> <li>Also, nobody knows <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/chatbot-hallucinations-inevitable/">how to stop the "hallucinations"</a></li> <li>In pursuit of training data, the most highly valued companies in the world are racing to slurp up the entire searchable internet (most of which is <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/27/business/media/new-york-times-open-ai-microsoft-lawsuit.html">copyrighted</a>) and then hiding their theft behind a series of <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/conde-nast-openai-deal/">exclusive</a> <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2024/2/22/24080165/google-reddit-ai-training-data">content</a> <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/two-major-academic-publishers-signed-deals-with-ai-companies-some-professors-are-outraged">deals</a></li> <li>That slurry of content is full of <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/02/04/137602/this-is-how-ai-bias-really-happensand-why-its-so-hard-to-fix/">biases and bigotry</a> from every murky corner of the web</li> <li>Generative AI models trained on that diet spew out <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/advanced-ai-chatbots-perpetuate-racist-debunked-medical-ideas-research-rcna121438">harmful medical advice</a> and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2023/ai-generated-images-bias-racism-sexism-stereotypes/">corny stereotypes</a>; they <a href="https://themarkup.org/machine-learning/2023/08/14/ai-detection-tools-falsely-accuse-international-students-of-cheating">incorrectly label students' papers as AI-generated</a> and <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2024-openai-gpt-hiring-racial-discrimination/">rank résumés lower based on the applicant's name</a></li> <li>Speaking of copyrighted content, people making a living in the creative industries <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ai-taking-jobs-fears-artists-say-already-happening-2023-10">are losing jobs</a> to programs <a href="https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/03/02/what-happens-when-your-art-is-used-to-train-ai">trained on their own work</a></li> <li>Original creative work is being <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2024/6/27/24187405/perplexity-ai-twitter-lie-plagiarism">ripped off</a> or <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/11/style/ai-search-slop.html">drowned out by AI “slop”</a></li> <li>Workers are paid poorly for everything from <a href="https://time.com/6247678/openai-chatgpt-kenya-workers/">labeling training data</a> to <a href="https://www.404media.co/kaedim-ai-startup-2d-to-3d-used-cheap-human-labor/">pretending to be AI</a> themselves</li> <li>Some of the biggest names in AI have no compunctions about <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/05/14/middle-east-ai-tech-companies-saudi-arabia-uae/">partnering with authoritarian governments</a> or espousing <a href="https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/23298870/effective-altruism-longtermism-will-macaskill-future">philosophies</a> that value the lives of people in the far future over those of people who are struggling to live now</li> <li>A single query to a large language model <a href="https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2024-08-26/tech-firms-conceal-water-and-power-demands-of-ai-computing">can consume 3 to 10 times as much energy</a> as a simple web search</li> <li>Tech giants are fast-tracking data centers to host the models, at the cost of <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/1d468bd2-6712-4cdd-ac71-21e0ace2d048">millions of gallons of fresh water</a> a week</li> <li>This accelerated consumption is <a href="https://hbr.org/2024/07/the-uneven-distribution-of-ais-environmental-impacts">having an outsized impact</a> on communities that are already at an environmental disadvantage</li> <li>It’s hard to enjoy using a tool when you’re aware of its <a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7bwp4/axon-acquires-fusus-ai-surveillance-retail-healthcare">surveillance</a>, <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/11/20/does-a-i-lead-police-to-ignore-contradictory-evidence">policing</a> and <a href="https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/">military applications</a></li> </ul> </ul> … and that’s just the tip of a very dirty iceberg. Unfortunately for me (and for the world), I’m convinced that generative AI can also be extremely useful. <hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/> This year I have been working out how I can use AI in a way that gets around some of these issues, with limited success. The credo I’ve settled on is “Run locally and verify.” There are specialized models small enough to run on personal devices, and tools like <a href="https://lmstudio.ai/">LM Studio</a>, <a href="https://ollama.com/">Ollama</a>, and <a href="https://github.com/simonw/llm">llm</a> make them easy to download, run, and tinker with. Now I can run experiments, extract text from PDFs, analyze large datasets, ask coding questions, and transcribe audio on my 3-year-old laptop’s processors. The local models aren’t as fast or capable as the hosted options, but they get the job done. Critically, and in accordance with <a href="https://themarkup.org/ethics#ai-ethics">The Markup’s AI ethics policy</a>, I check the results for accuracy and will always disclose when I’ve used AI in the production of a story. It’s an approach that doesn’t address many of my concerns, but at least with this setup, I don’t have to worry about dumping water on the ground every time I hit “Enter.” What about you? If you’re struggling with how to use AI or another technology ethically and have found effective workarounds, I’d love to hear about it. <hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/> I wish I could dismiss AI, like <a href="https://www.web3isgoinggreat.com/">cryptocurrency</a> or the <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/what-is-the-metaverse/">metaverse</a>: hyped-up technologies with limited practical applications (unless you’re extorting money or fancy wearing bulky headgear to talk to an avatar of your boss). AI is overhyped, but even if the industry bubble pops tomorrow, the technology’s genuine utility means it’s not likely to disappear from our lives. That’s why, despite my misgivings, I needed to figure out how to use these tools in a way that minimized their harms, at least so that I could report on them responsibly. Here are a few things that convinced me that AI (generative and beyond) has real-world utility: <ul> <li>AI’s <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/air-canada-chatbot-refund-policy/">spectacular</a> <a href="https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-artificial-intelligence-deceptive-phone-calls-33bab2049c12f952eb683a83039ddbba">public</a> <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/25/24050334/x-twitter-taylor-swift-ai-fake-images-trending">failures</a> reveal newsworthy things about the values of the people who build and use it</li> <li>A software engineer working with <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/29/24055011/meta-llama2-code-generator-generative-ai">the right models</a> can solve coding problems more quickly and take on more challenging tasks in unfamiliar languages</li> <li>AI models are improving automated <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2024/04/voice-dictation-siri-ai-boom/678001/">transcription of human speech</a> and <a href="https://www.zdnet.com/article/metas-massive-multilingual-translation-opus-still-stumbles-on-greek-icelandic-oromo/">translation between languages</a></li> <li>People have been using <a href="https://medium.com/pew-research-center-decoded/an-intro-to-topic-models-for-text-analysis-de5aa3e72bdb">machine learning tools</a> to analyze data for decades; modern large language models are easier to use for the same type of work, and are more flexible about their inputs (for example, reporters can use <a href="https://www.axios.com/2024/08/20/washington-post-ai-tool-data">the Washington Post’s new Haystacker tool</a> to search and analyze data across text, images, and video)</li> <li>Non-generative machine learning tools like computer vision are getting better; the New York Times used computer vision to reveal that <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/21/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-bomb-investigation.html">Israel dropped hundreds of 2,000-pound bombs</a> in civilian areas of Gaza</li> <li>Machine learning has proven useful in the life sciences, including for <a href="https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/01/20/how-to-use-sound-and-ai-to-protect-the-environment">analyzing field recordings to support rainforest preservation</a> and <a href="https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/02/03/how-ai-is-helping-us-learn-about-birds">forecasting bird migrations</a></li> <li>Also, it can be terribly fun to report about <a href="https://themarkup.org/news/2024/03/29/nycs-ai-chatbot-tells-businesses-to-break-the-law">the embarrassing things chatbots say</a></li> </ul> </ul> I know that this technology is disruptive. I’m not happy with how it’s hurting workers and guzzling key environmental resources. I’m trying my best to mitigate the downsides. But if I’m being honest with myself, it doesn’t feel like I’m doing enough, and as an industry, we need to prioritize ethical considerations when we think about using generative AI. How are you thinking about these issues? How is AI affecting your work? What are you doing in response? Tell me about it at <a href="mailto:tomas@themarkup.org">tomas@themarkup.org</a>. Thanks for reading, Tomas Apodaca Journalism Engineer The Markup / CalMatters ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79914</guid> <pubDate>Sat, 07 Sep 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Tomas Apodaca </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/hello-world-ai-ethics-olga-aleksandrova.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/hello-world/2024/09/07/how-im-trying-to-use-generative-ai-as-a-journalism-engineer-ethically'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>Project 2025 targets California’s abortion data privacy protections</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/09/14/project-2025-targets-californias-abortion-data-privacy-protections</link> <description>A Republican presidency could require California to monitor abortions and send sensitive data to the CDC</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>A Republican presidency could require California to monitor abortions and send sensitive data to the CDC</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/091024-ABORTION-SURVEILLANCE-GH-CM-16x9-1-1682x946.jpg" alt="Photo collage of Donald Trump looking down and signing a document; the background shows a pixelated ultrasound placed in front of a duotone image of the CDC building" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Gabriel Hongsdusit </figcaption> </figure> </div> Hey y’all,  As we get closer to Election Day, the investigative team at CalMatters has been finding ways to stay grounded in what’s at stake and localize national issues. So, Monique O. Madan, one of our investigative reporters, and I have spent the last several weeks reading through Project 2025, the 900-page transition plan for the next Republican president. <a href="https://calmatters.org/politics/2024/09/project2025-trump-california-abortion-surveillance/">Mo’s new story out this week</a> illustrates the ultimatum Project 2025 issues California: start tracking and reporting abortion data to the federal government or risk losing billions in Medicaid funding for reproductive health services. Roger Severino, the director of the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights under Trump, authored this plan. Although Donald Trump keeps trying to distance himself from Project 2025, including at Tuesday’s debate, nearly every chapter is written by formers in his administration, like Severino. California is one of just three states along with Maryland and New Hampshire that does not require abortion providers to report patient data to the federal government. But under Severino’s plan, all 50 states would be required to submit the following to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: <ul> <li>the reason for the abortion, </li> <li>fetus’ gestational age, </li> <li>the birthing parent’s state of residence, </li> <li>whether the procedure was surgical or pill-induced</li> <li>and more</li> </ul> </ul> Severino singled out California in particular for protecting the procedure and also becoming a destination for people in states where abortion is banned. “Because liberal states have now become sanctuaries for abortion tourism, [the Department of Health and Human Services] should use every available tool, including the cutting of funds, to ensure that every state reports exactly how many abortions take place within its borders, at what gestational age of the child, for what reason, the mother’s state of residence, and by what method,” reads the chapter on abortion reporting.  Experts told Mo this kind of surveillance could be a deterrent to already vulnerable populations. Losing billions in Medicaid, the single largest payer of maternity care in the country, would also jeopardize comprehensive services like contraceptives, counseling, reproductive health education, prenatal care, labor and delivery, postpartum care, STI and cancer testing, and infertility treatments. “If a state like California decided to not comply with those abortion reporting requirements, it could lose billions of dollars and would likely hamstring the ability of the state to provide sexual and reproductive healthcare services,” said Cat Duffy, a policy analyst at the National Health Law Program. “Because while I think that there are states that would try to compensate with state funds, it’s just a lot of money to make up and that it could potentially be really devastating.” If you have any thoughts or tips for Mo in the future, here’s how you can reach her:  Monique O. Madan madan@themarkup.org  (786) 369 – 6249 P.O. Box 832155 Miami, FL 33283 Thanks for reading,  Ko Bragg, Investigative Editor, CalMatters ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79934</guid> <pubDate>Sat, 14 Sep 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Ko Bragg </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/091024-ABORTION-SURVEILLANCE-GH-CM-16x9-1.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/hello-world/2024/09/14/project-2025-targets-californias-abortion-data-privacy-protections'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>How AI Detection Software Turns Professors into Cops, Tech as Systems of World-Making, and More</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/09/21/maywa-montenegro-agroecology-pegagogy-ai</link> <description>A conversation with agroecologist Maywa Montenegro</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>A conversation with agroecologist Maywa Montenegro</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/hello-world-ai-classroom_reduced-1682x946.jpg" alt="Photo collage of a series of duotone neon-green and blue panels that feature images of a farming tractor, a woman wearing a headset with her hands in her face, an image of a ChatGPT answer in Spanish, hands cupped together dripping water, a parrot and an overhead shot of two workers standing at an energy grid" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Photo illustration by Gabriel Hongsdusit; images by Getty and Ehécatl Cabrera under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license </figcaption> </figure> </div>  Hello again, Two weeks ago I shared how I was <a href="https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/09/07/how-im-trying-to-use-generative-ai-as-a-journalism-engineer-ethically">trying to find an ethical way to use generative AI in the newsroom</a>. As I was writing that article, I came across someone who was thinking about the same issues in a different discipline. <a href="https://envs.ucsc.edu/faculty/index.php?uid=mamonten">Maywa Montenegro</a> is an assistant professor of agroecology, the study and practice of food systems transformation, and critical technology studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She wrote and edited for <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seed_%28magazine%29">Seed</a>, the now-defunct science and culture magazine, where <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20100716020145/http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/in_defense_of_difference/P1/">her reporting</a> on the intersection of sustainability and food systems inspired her to get an environmental science PhD. In August, Montenegro shared the AI policy she created for her classes: <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1t4Qjpu5aqjh0TyQfTm8I_-UfrV4vWnBF4ENwyud3aGQ/pub">AI policy: a critically engaged approach</a>. As soon as I read it, I knew I’d found someone who was struggling with the same questions I was. I reached out to Montenegro to talk about why she’d written the policy and how it had been received. We discussed technology hype cycles, how AI detection software turns professors into cops, what AI is really good for, and, briefly, lettuce-harvesting robots. Our conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity. <hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/headshot-mayway-montenegro-1280x1306.jpg" alt="Maywa Montenegro" width="1280" height="1306"> <figcaption> Maywa Montenegro <div style="margin-top: 5px;">Courtesy of Maywa Montenegro</div></figcaption></figure> Tomas Apodaca: Let’s start by talking about AI. Is AI a part of your regular coursework? Maywa Montenegro: AI is not a central area that I research or write about. Probably the closest that I come in my own scholarship is in the realm of digital agriculture, where we have some projects that are at the cutting edge of where agricultural systems are butting up against all forms of digitalization: internet of things, remote sensing, many kinds of tools that are digital, and some of those are also machine-learning–enabled now. One of my grad students works on automation in Salinas Valley lettuce, these robots that are being trained to harvest. Apodaca: How did you realize that the use of AI in your courses was something you needed to address in a written policy? Montenegro: Because I am a scholar of <a href="https://cstms.berkeley.edu/research/sts/">science and technology studies</a> (STS), I’ve been following AI’s development for some time. I won’t credit myself with being one of the early whistleblowers on this, but it has a specific contour that we talk about as “hype cycles.” There are these technologies that receive extraordinary inflations in interest, in our economy of interest, in investments—especially in Silicon Valley. And then they tend to fizzle. They don’t usually die away completely, like we saw with crypto, but the attention certainly dies down. Fast forward to the release of ChatGPT. The narrative surrounding AI is that people will be “left behind” unless they adopt it ASAP. How is AI going to revolutionize education? How is it going to transform agriculture? How is it going to make logistics a million times smarter? Almost every sector is being faced with the proposition that they should jump on the AI train or risk getting left behind. To my frustration, rather than having concerted, critical, and honest conversations around who benefits from this technology—and why and how—we’ve been sold the idea that it’s inevitable, and we better figure out how to make use of it, to deal with it as best we can. People respond to that in different ways, but <a href="https://tlc.ucsc.edu/resources/artificial-intelligence-in-teaching-learning/">the policies that have been encouraged at UCSC</a> have not been top-down, like “You must use it in your class,” but, “You must at least provide language in your syllabus that explains to students what your expectations are.”  That was my moment where I realized, OK, I’m going to have to figure out what are the rules, in terms of using AI for homework and assignments and exams. Then, in my philosophy of teaching, I’m really committed to not using a “stick” approach with students, in the metaphor of the carrot and the stick. I could see some approaches to AI being more punitive, like “I will do this and this if you use AI,” or I’m going to do Simone Biles types of gymnastics in order to create assignments that will try to impede you from using AI. That seemed like adding extraordinary labor to teaching when it’s already challenging enough, and somewhat of a cat-and-mouse game. These students are super smart. Students were even <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/im-a-student-you-have-no-idea-how-much-were-using-chatgpt">writing articles</a> in the Chronicle of Higher Education about how they were getting around teachers’ new assignments. I really wanted to approach my students as <a href="https://guides.library.harvard.edu/criticalpedagogy">empowered agents of their own learning</a> and to express to them, in the best way that I could at the time, what my reservations are. Not just with the tool in a technical sense and how it, as many people have confirmed, is much more like <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3442188.3445922">a stochastic parrot</a> than it is something that learns or that is cognitive.  Beyond that, there is the larger “assemblage” of AI that enables these systems to run in the first place. Since I’m an environmental studies professor, it became clear that a lot of those pieces were an entire material world of energy, water, and other resources; of labor undervalued and exploited. And there’s the racialized and encoded assumptions that emanate through the texts upon which these chatbots are trained. That became exciting to me. I hope that in combination with the content of my class, students would become either revolted or simply disinterested in using AI in class assignments. That was the goal. Apodaca: How did it play out with your students? Montenegro: I heard a few prominent reactions. One is that the students felt really grateful that a professor had taken time to provide them with a context for understanding ChatGPT. And the second response was, “Wow, we had no idea about the labor part!” Towards the end of the course, I sent out a survey to the students and asked whether they had ever run across a policy like this before. Were there things that they would like to see added? Were there things that they had not known before and learned? Most of them said that they had never seen a policy like this before. So that was interesting for me to learn. And many of them responded by mentioning the environmental impact. I think that really strikes a nerve with students who are environmental studies majors. The responses were, “I’m even less likely to use this than I was before,” which made me feel more than happy. Apodaca: In the policy, you tell students that they can reach out to the teaching team if they feel pressured to use these tools for your course. Did that ever happen? Montenegro: That did not happen. Apodaca: Do you think that’s a good thing, that nobody reached out? Montenegro: I might have a biased sample, given that the students are in <a href="https://ucsc.smartcatalogiq.com/en/current/general-catalog/courses/envs-environmental-studies/upper-division/envs-130b/">a course on principles of just and sustainable agriculture</a>. I was listening the other day to folks talking about, “Is the bubble going to burst?” This hype spike has been so high that I don’t think it’s going to just collapse and vanish. It’s going to be here, including in journalism, which has been something that concerns me a lot as a former journalist. I am here for that long conversation. I’m a researcher who works in the publishing world and peer review journals. A few weeks ago, <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/two-major-academic-publishers-signed-deals-with-ai-companies-some-professors-are-outraged">it was made public</a> that Informa, the parent company of Taylor and Francis, and another large publishing firm had signed a contract to train OpenAI models on language from the peer review journals. But authors who put their research into these journals were not made aware. I’m an editor of <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/journals/wjsa21">an Informa-edited journal</a> and I was not aware. That’s just wild to me, that these contracts are being signed and <a href="https://theconversation.com/an-academic-publisher-has-struck-an-ai-data-deal-with-microsoft-without-their-authors-knowledge-235203#:~:text=However%2C%20the%20update%20also%20says">then they say</a>, “Don’t worry, copyrights are still intact. We’re not going to have big passages reused, that’s going to be OK.” There is such an entitlement that, like, everything is fine. We are already publishing not-for-pay in these journals. And the fact that that text would then be repurposed and sold as training data… that contract was several million dollars.  It’s things like that that frustrate me because it’s going back to the pedagogical value: Why are we doing this? Even if you believe that the machine is learning, your brain is not learning. And you might be in debt—tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars—from your education. Do you really want to walk away without having given your brain, your mind and intellect, the gift of that learning, even if it’s a struggle? That blows my mind. Why would we do this? Please don’t. That’s where I’m at with it. And I think students respect it when you aren’t approaching them with this as a punitive measure because then they’re going to react and want to use it just to piss you off, honestly. Or because they’re curious. And they ought to be curious! But I’m curious whether it will show up on the other side, where for a long time we’ve had challenges in finding peer reviewers because there’s just a surplus of papers coming in relative to the available labor to peer review. How long is it before they tell us, “Just as a first pass, consider using our new Informa-trained ChatGPT to whittle down the stack of papers?” Apodaca: Education technology is a big industry, and generative AI is only its most recent innovation. Have you used ed-tech in the past and has it helped you as an educator? Montenegro: Technology for me… we could definitely go down a rabbit hole here. In agriculture and in food systems, it’s hard to define. Is a “technology” a fence? If it has some relation to the system of production in an applied fashion, where do we bound technology? For me, it’s most useful to think of it as a system of world-making. It’s not just that tool that we can see. It’s all of the infrastructure, the political economy, the knowledge that enables it and that it in turn enables. So I can’t not use technology in education. It wouldn’t make sense for me. I have had the gift of a mentor who’s non-hearing, and text-to-speech recognition has been game-changing for us in terms of our capacity to converse. It is machine learning that does this speech recognition. And Google Suite—although it does not make me happy to enrich Eric Schmidt—those kinds of things have helped a lot. I have experimented with live polls, collaborative annotation tools. As we’ve been able to return to the classroom in real and embodied space, just having conversations—I think students really crave face-to-face time, contact, dialogue and allowing that to breathe. In the past year, especially, that has been much more of a pedagogical game-saver than any new tool that I’ve introduced. Apodaca: There are <a href="https://themarkup.org/machine-learning/2023/08/14/ai-detection-tools-falsely-accuse-international-students-of-cheating">AI detectors out there</a>, and TurnItIn is probably the most well-known in the educational context. Do you use TurnItIn? Montenegro: No. I am an abolitionist. So I believe in anti-carceral frameworks, not in policing and patrolling people, including my students. A tool that uses AI to detect AI, because it is embedding racially encoded language, is almost certainly going to have problems with false detection. Even if it’s correct, you will wind up monitoring and potentially penalizing students who struggle with language. This leads to all sorts of problems in terms of bias in the classroom. I don’t want to be a cop in my classroom. The university does not allow us to use detection technologies in our classroom unless certain standards are met. That is a <a href="https://ucsc-expghost.imodules.com/controls/email_marketing/view_in_browser.aspx?sid=1069&gid=1001&sendId=4255642&ecatid=4&puid=">constraint at UC Santa Cruz</a>. Ruha Benjamin’s fabulous book <a href="https://www.ruhabenjamin.com/race-after-technology">“Race After Technology”</a> goes in-depth into this, not even in the realm of AI, per se, but this is an older thing of technology. Ruha’s point about redlining and <a href="https://themarkup.org/prediction-bias/2023/10/02/predictive-policing-software-terrible-at-predicting-crimes">predictive</a> <a href="https://themarkup.org/prediction-bias/2024/01/29/senators-demand-justice-department-halt-funding-to-predictive-policing-programs">policing</a>—which had been built on racially-encoded maps of where people live and aren’t allowed to live and get <a href="https://themarkup.org/denied/2021/08/25/the-secret-bias-hidden-in-mortgage-approval-algorithms">mortgages for houses</a>—AI produces these models in which we are reinforcing and perpetuating systems of violence through the perceivably neutral and unbiased language of the algorithm. “How can it be racist? It’s just an algorithm!” Apodaca: In the policy, you write, “many of us are trying to figure out what AI is, what it is good for.” Have you figured it out? Have you thought of anything that it’s good for? Montenegro: For me, as a scholar of technology, I think it has opened up a lot of discussions in terms of what we value and why. When we’re talking to our students about all of the things that ChatGPT is and isn’t, what it does and can’t do, I think at the core of it we get down to: “Why are we doing this? Why are we here?” Sure, you could use this even though it uses <a href="https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2023/04/15/the-secret-water-footprint-of-ai-technology">so many million gallons of water</a> when we are in the midst of a drought in California; when we know that it’s using <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/09/18/energy-ai-use-electricity-water-data-centers/">gargantuan amounts of energy</a> and we’re fighting desperately to control the climate crisis; and that it <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/chatgpt-openai-content-abusive-sexually-explicit-harassment-kenya-workers-on-human-workers-cf191483">extracts labor from underpaid workers in Kenya</a> and we are talking about racial capitalism. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignleft"><blockquote>The gifts of AI come in weird ways.<cite>Maywa Montenegro</cite></blockquote></figure> Even if you decide, “This is a hard time for me. I have to get my passing grade or I’m going to flunk out,” I want to honor that. I want to honor that students are in this struggle, but also, what is the role of education and why are we doing this at all? Because you can get your grade and you can get out of here. But at the end of the day, why do we care about any of this? What’s it worth? AI has—inadvertently, for sure—brought up those root-cause problems of systemic crises and enabled us to have conversations about them. One of the reasons that I put the policy out on Twitter (now known as X), in the spirit of putting it out into the world: I’m inspired by the Indigenous Métis scholar <a href="https://maxliboiron.com/">Max Liboiron</a> in Canada. They are also indigenous STS and they put a lot of their resistance pieces on Twitter before they left the platform. I wanted to just put it out there, let people adapt, reuse, and hope that people would tell me stories about how it would be useful for them, if it was. And in the past few days, I’ve actually gotten emails from colleagues saying, “Is this true? Can we actually use this?” And it has sparked some conversations. So that’s really fulfilling for me, just having that kind of community interested in charting a different path and engaging students critically in questions of technology. The gifts of AI come in weird ways. <hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/> When I shared my thoughts about <a href="https://themarkup.org/hello-world/2024/09/07/how-im-trying-to-use-generative-ai-as-a-journalism-engineer-ethically">ethical AI use in the newsroom</a> two weeks ago, I asked you to let me know how you’re grappling with AI in your own homes and offices. A handful of you took the time to write very thoughtful responses. If you find these articles thought-provoking, I’d still love to hear from you, write to me at <a href="mailto:tomas@themarkup.org">tomas@themarkup.org</a>. Thanks for reading,  Tomas Apodaca Journalism Engineer The Markup / CalMatters ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79950</guid> <pubDate>Sat, 21 Sep 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Tomas Apodaca </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/hello-world-ai-classroom_reduced.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/hello-world/2024/09/21/maywa-montenegro-agroecology-pegagogy-ai'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>The Markup Wins ONA Awards for General Excellence and Community-Centered Journalism</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2024/09/23/online-news-general-excellence-gather-community-award</link> <description>The awards honor excellence in digital journalism around the world</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>The awards honor excellence in digital journalism around the world</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/2024-ona-winner-lead-v2-1682x946.jpg" alt="Collage of five stories from The Markup that won the 2024 ONA General Excellence in Online Journalism and Community-Centered Journalism Awards" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> The Markup </figcaption> </figure> </div> The Markup has won <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/entries/the-markup-3/">first place for general excellence</a> in the small newsroom category and the <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/entries/languages-of-misinformation/">Gather Award</a> for community-centered journalism in the <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/about/">2024 Online Journalism Awards</a>. The awards honor excellence in digital journalism around the world and innovative work in digital storytelling.  Judges called The Markup’s work, “Outstanding, actionable journalism that given the subject manner could not have come at a more consequential moment.” CalMatters, which The Markup is now a part of, was also a <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/entries/calmatters-2/">finalist</a> for general excellence in the medium newsroom category. <a href="https://calmatters.org/inside-the-newsroom/2024/09/the-markup-calmatters-ona-award-general-excellence/">Read more</a> about how CalMatters’ journalism told Californians what their state government is doing for them and to them in the last year. <h2>General Excellence Award</h2> The Markup is honored <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/entries/the-markup-3/">to win ONA’s general excellence in online journalism award</a>, which “honors a digitally focused news organization that successfully fulfills its editorial mission, effectively serves its audience, maximizes the use of digital tools and platforms and represents the highest journalistic standards.”  In the last year, The Markup’s journalism aimed to fulfill our mission of challenging technology to serve the public good, and for our work to give people more control over the technology affecting their lives. A sample of our work in the last year includes: 🧮 Data- and Software-Driven Reporting  Using nearly 100 accounts, The Markup conducted the <a href="https://themarkup.org/automated-censorship/2024/02/25/how-we-investigated-shadowbanning-on-instagram">first field audit</a> of Instagram’s content moderation algorithms and <a href="https://themarkup.org/automated-censorship/2024/02/25/demoted-deleted-and-denied-theres-more-than-just-shadowbanning-on-instagram">our data found</a> that they routinely limited the reach of posts supporting Palestine and denied users the ability to appeal. Our uniquely comprehensive “digital book ban” <a href="https://themarkup.org/digital-book-banning/2024/04/13/schools-were-just-supposed-to-block-porn-instead-they-sabotaged-homework-and-censored-suicide-prevention-sites">investigation</a> used data to reveal how web filters across 16 U.S. school districts in 11 states kept students from doing homework, exacerbated inequities, and discriminated ideologically. Finally, The Markup testing revealed that NYC’s AI chatbot <a href="https://themarkup.org/news/2024/03/29/nycs-ai-chatbot-tells-businesses-to-break-the-law">told business owners to break the law</a>. The Markup asked the bot dozens of questions and found it was frequently wrong, advising visitors to discriminate in housing and to take workers’ tips. 🦸 Tools that Give People Superpowers After the Washington Post reported X was throttling links to competitors, The Markup <a href="https://themarkup.org/investigations/2023/09/15/twitter-is-still-throttling-competitors-links-check-for-yourself">published a tool</a> that lets anyone check if X throttles any link. Readers ran hundreds of tests and found delays reaching Patreon, WhatsApp, and Messenger, leading to a second story with Patreon creators explaining how the delays hurt their income. Readers have also used our real-time privacy inspector, <a href="https://themarkup.org/series/blacklight">Blacklight</a>, to scan websites for trackers nearly 16 million times, exposing abusive tracking by OB-GYNs, online pharmacies, and ed tech companies. 🤝 Partnership Between Communities and Newsrooms In late 2022, The Markup exposed how major internet providers systematically give the worst deals to poorer and least-White neighborhoods—a data-driven investigation that eventually won a <a href="https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2024/01/17/the-markup-wins-philip-meyer-journalism-award">Philip Meyer award</a>.  Since then, we’ve equipped affected communities to fight that discrimination, <a href="https://themarkup.org/the-breakdown/2023/08/01/how-to-search-for-a-better-deal-on-broadband">teaching readers</a> how to find a better internet deal, how to fact-check company’s claims to the FCC (over 5,000 of them did, including the <a href="https://outliermedia.org/detroit-documenters/">Detroit Documenters</a>), and publishing “<a href="https://themarkup.org/still-loading/2023/08/11/magic-spreadsheets-that-equip-the-public">magic spreadsheets</a>” that allow anyone to analyze internet speeds for disparities (a <a href="https://themarkup.org/still-loading/2023/08/11/magic-spreadsheets-that-equip-the-public#where-to-look-for-your-story">Chicago community youth group did</a> so, presenting their findings to the mayor). Following our work, the <a href="https://themarkup.org/still-loading/2023/11/15/fcc-approves-rules-to-prevent-digital-discrimination">FCC approved</a> rules against digital discrimination, and <a href="https://themarkup.org/still-loading/2024/02/01/los-angeles-becomes-first-us-city-to-outlaw-digital-discrimination">Los Angeles became</a> the first city to outlaw it entirely. We sought even closer collaboration with communities for reporting on misinformation, doing stories based on what dozens of Vietnamese immigrants in Oakland, California, told us they needed. The series that resulted, “<a href="https://themarkup.org/series/languages-of-misinformation">Languages of Misinformation</a>,” was also awarded in the Online News Awards—more on that below. <h2>Community-Centered Journalism Award</h2> Our series on the impact of misinformation on the Vietnamese immigrant community <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/entries/languages-of-misinformation/">won first place for community-centered journalism</a> among small newsrooms. The Online News Award award was presented by <a href="https://letsgather.in">Gather</a>, a project and platform to support community-minded journalists and other engagement professionals.  This award honors people, projects, and processes that center community information needs and voices in the production of journalistic work — something that investigative reporter Lam Thuy Vo embodied in her work reporting on misinformation in Vietnamese communities. While misinformation and deepfakes are a known issue to much of the U.S. population, this awareness does not always spread to immigrant communities who do not speak English. In this series, The Markup sought to change this. Lam began her reporting by doing an information needs assessment with one community: Vietnamese people above the age of 50 in Oakland, California. She conducted a focus group interview with 30 people, did individual interviews, and analyzed the YouTube archive of one volunteer who donated her YouTube viewing history of more than 17,000 videos. We learned that many community members got their news on YouTube, and from specific influencers who translated sites like Newsmax and Breitbart into Vietnamese.  Our <a href="https://themarkup.org/news/2023/06/09/vietnamese-youtuber-is-filling-information-voids-with-newsmax-and-breitbart">first story</a> focused on shedding light on what we found: For some immigrant communities, the only news that is accessible to them, is translated misinformation.  Our <a href="https://themarkup.org/languages-of-misinformation/2023/11/16/meet-the-vietnamese-grandmother-fighting-misinformation-one-youtube-video-at-a-time">second piece</a> focused on the oral history of Bùi Như Mai, a 67-year-old Vietnamese grandmother who started translating mainstream media into Vietnamese because she was worried about the misinformation consumed by her community.  Our third story was <a href="https://themarkup.org/languages-of-misinformation/2023/12/15/second-generation-americans-what-to-do-when-loved-ones-are-sharing-misinformation">a guide for all second generation immigrants</a> on how to talk to their loved ones about misinformation, since many children of immigrants have struggled to talk to their parents about misinformation in their native tongue. We published our work in English and in Vietnamese, in partnership with Vietnamese grassroots organization <a href="https://vietfactcheck.org/">Viet Fact Check</a>, whose volunteers translated our stories.  Finally, we built two workshops to address the information gaps that Vietnamese elders were facing. <a href="https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1QV_d0fgDPR5V111obBdPxciNT4Lj-EbBdEPL8o4z7cY/edit#slide=id.g260c85ff626_0_0">The first</a> explained the main misinformation issues the community was facing and showcased tools like Google Translate for the community to use. It was service journalism delivered in person and in Vietnamese, and was received with excitement. A handful of Vietnamese community members installed the Google Translate app. The <a href="https://themarkup.org/languages-of-misinformation/2024/04/25/how-i-explained-ai-and-deepfakes-using-only-basic-vietnamese">second workshop</a> focused on explaining artificial intelligence and its capacity to create deepfakes, and how people can spot them. <h2>Excellence in Technology Reporting</h2> The Markup <a href="https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2024/08/17/the-markups-clear-and-beautiful-reporting-wins-online-journalism-award">also won</a> the Online News Association’s <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/entries/digital-book-banning/">Excellence in Technology Reporting award</a> in the small newsroom category in early award announcements a month ago. The award was for the investigative series on internet censorship in schools, “<a href="https://themarkup.org/series/digital-book-banning">Digital Book Banning</a>” and the honor marks a back-to-back win for The Markup, which last year <a href="https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2023/08/28/the-markup-wins-ona-award-in-technology-reporting">took the same prize</a> for its coverage of internet bandwidth disparities. Congratulations to the entire Markup team for the recognition of their hard work. Congratulations, too, to all of this year’s <a href="https://awards.journalists.org/winners/2024/">ONA finalists and award winners</a>. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,79975</guid> <pubDate>Mon, 23 Sep 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Sonya Quick and Sisi Wei </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/2024-ona-winner-lead-v2.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/inside-the-markup/2024/09/23/online-news-general-excellence-gather-community-award'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>TikTok Videos Spread Misinformation to New Migrant Community in New York City</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/languages-of-misinformation/2024/09/26/tiktok-videos-spread-misinformation-to-new-migrant-community-in-new-york-city</link> <description>Misinformation on TikTok influenced these Senegalese migrants to come to the United States. Now they are being fed even more misleading information about navigating their new home</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>Misinformation on TikTok influenced these Senegalese migrants to come to the United States. Now they are being fed even more misleading information about navigating their new home</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/The-Markup_Senegalese-Migrants-TikTok_Final-1682x946.jpg" alt="Illustration of a line of Senegalese men standing in front of a brightly lit iPhone; the man at the front is stepping into the phone's vibrant landscape, creating a striking contrast with the darker surroundings" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Sabrena Khadija </figcaption> </figure> </div> This article is copublished with <a href="https://documentedny.com/">Documented</a>, a multilingual news site about immigrants in New York, and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/article/2024/may/31/douyin-china-tiktok-walk-the-line-videos">The Guardian US</a>, which covers American and international news for an online, global audience. One video told viewers that new migrants easily get work permits and good jobs in the United States. Another warned viewers, once they are in the U.S., not to change their postal address or transfer their asylum case if they move to another state. Another instructed them to re-apply for asylum if they do not receive an acknowledgment letter within a few months.   These videos were all posted on TikTok in French or Wolof, the languages spoken by many of the West African migrants who have arrived in New York City in the last two years. Documented reviewed hundreds of videos like these. Some aimed to inform, advise or persuade viewers and appeared to be well-meaning. Many featured migrants sharing their <a href="https://www.tiktokv.com/share/video/7348192594565860651/">first-hand experiences </a>of the asylum process to encourage others in their position, and some filmed candidly in supermarkets, on park benches, or in their cars.  Other videos, however, were not so well-meaning.  An industry of highly coordinated smuggling organizations are using social media apps like TikTok to promise seamless travel services — procuring airplane tickets, helping with visa applications, or providing places to stay during your trip to the U.S. One migrant from the Republic of Congo told Documented he was led by one smuggler to Brazil, where another agent then hosted him for two months in a safehouse with 10 other African migrants and took them onward to Panama by passing through the treacherous Darién Gap. Documented spoke with five Senegalese men who migrated to New York City in the past year who said that TikTok played a significant role in their decision to make the arduous journey to the U.S. Like thousands of <a href="https://documentedny.com/2024/05/31/china-tiktok-migration-douyin/">other migrants</a> who have made their way to the U.S. from China, Latin America and West Africa, these five men were inspired by testimonials from other migrants they saw on TikTok about their journeys to the city. And like many other migrants, they were frustrated that the hardship they faced in the U.S. stood in stark contrast to the optimistic videos that inspired them to make the journey. Even after arriving in the U.S., TikTok continues to play an outsized role in their new lives. ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, did not respond to a request for comment at the time of publication.  In the last five months, Documented analyzed the TikTok viewing history of five Senegalese migrants between 22 to 36-years-old, and who all arrived in New York in the past two years. For many members of this predominantly non-English speaking community, this was the first time they left their home country, and navigating life in New York City felt isolating and filled with incomprehensible rules and uncertainty. TikTok became a valuable place to get information, and provided people with seemingly helpful tips from how to open a bank account to how to pronounce common English phrases. Documented identified about 300 videos that had been watched by at least three men who shared their TikTok history. Between pranks and soccer clips, the men watched videos that provided either partial or inaccurate content about vital matters like how to fill out legal forms for requesting asylum, that if acted upon, could derail their asylum processes and integration into American society. In one of the <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@maffthebarber/video/7338298006548106527">misleading videos</a>, the poster speaks about Mayor Eric Adams’ policies towards the city’s migrant population. The video, narrated in Wolof, features a man translating and explaining what he claims is a news story. He displays a screenshot of an English headline from the <a href="https://manhattan.institute/article/inside-mayor-adams-migrant-debit-card-boondoggle-no-bid-bank-gets-50-million-border-crossers-up-to-10000-each">Manhattan Institute website</a>, along with a photo of Mayor Adams. In the video, the man falsely asserts that Mayor Adams is handing out $50 million in cash to distribute among New York City’s migrant community, urging viewers to “share this video widely” as it could be “life-changing” for immigrants. Here’s what really happened. In February, Mayor Adams introduced a program providing pre-paid debit cards for migrant families to use on food and baby supplies — not $50 million in unconditional cash payments. Ass Malick Lo, 30, heard about people taking the Central American route to the U.S. in August 2023, both through social media and some people he knew from his home country of Senegal. He watched live feeds of people on the route as well as pre-recorded videos. He had the contact information of an uncle in New York City and used his savings, borrowed from a friend and sold his car in order to make the trip.  When he arrived in New York, Lo said he was dependent on TikTok — videos helped him escape his surroundings, made him laugh and feel like he was with friends speaking Wolof. The social media app became one of the only sources of information and emotional support he could easily turn to when in doubt. “Migrant influencers are filling a void — sometimes providing hopeful information, but it might not always be truthful,” said Elora Mukherjee, professor of law at Columbia Law School where she directs the Immigrants’ Rights Clinic. Mukherjee said that it’s dangerous to have some of the  most commonly reiterated misinformation online about how it is “easy” to travel, seek asylum and work legally in the U.S. “I was made to believe that when you come, you will have papers and find work, but that’s not the case,” Lo said. Instead, after filing their application for asylum, migrants must wait at least six months before they can get a work permit. Asylum seekers and local officials have called for reforming work permit eligibility rules as their top priority to ease the burden on the city to shelter and provide for their basic needs.  “We should be a unified front on all levels of government calling for <a href="https://nypost.com/2023/06/06/nyc-council-presses-to-biden-to-fast-track-work-permits-for-migrants/">expedited federal work permits </a>to ensure asylum-seekers can legally work,” Councilmember Shahana Hanif said in an Oped in 2023. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has called on the White House to produce work permits in an interview with Documented last year. “What we are asking is for the federal government to get out of our way, so that our economy can function and we can integrate new Americans the way New York and New York City always has,” she said.  Made to rely on back-to-back shelter stays, and hand-outs of food, clothing and other daily necessities, in an effort to sustain themselves, asylum seekers sometimes find unauthorized and unregulated short-stint employment like delivering food, loading shipping containers and dishwashing in kitchens. “It is this built-in waiting period that overburdens the city, and until people are able to work lawfully, instability and often exploitation will continue,” said Mukherjee. “I’m lucky to be literate. I have come across migrants who missed deadlines for fingerprinting, or appointments with judges because they don’t understand the content of the letters they receive about their asylum cases,” said Lo, who holds a French language bachelor’s degree. Through his struggles to find stability in the U.S., Lo has grown to understand the harms of misinformation not only for himself but for the Senegalese migrant community he belongs to.  Now, Lo fact-checks the information he gets on TikTok by translating government websites from English to French and following verified news channels on social media. “I would use TikTok with skepticism and verify the information I see before acting on it, knowing what I know now,” said Lo. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,80021</guid> <pubDate>Thu, 26 Sep 2024 07:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Malick Gai </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/The-Markup_Senegalese-Migrants-TikTok_Final.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/languages-of-misinformation/2024/09/26/tiktok-videos-spread-misinformation-to-new-migrant-community-in-new-york-city'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>We Made an Emergency Alert Guide To Help Californians Navigate a Complicated Process. Here’s How To Do This In Any State</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/story-recipes/2024/09/27/emergency-alerts-how-to-guide</link> <description>CalMatters and The Markup reported on how residents in each of California’s 58 counties can sign up for local emergency alerts, and found a few surprises along the way. Here’s how you can build the same guide in your state</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>CalMatters and The Markup reported on how residents in each of California’s 58 counties can sign up for local emergency alerts, and found a few surprises along the way. Here’s how you can build the same guide in your state</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/recipe-card-emergency-alerts-1682x946.jpg" alt="Illustration of hands holding a recipe card; in the background are 6 panels, three panels are images of emergency alerts, three panels are illustrations of a cleaver with data blocks, a pot with speech bubbles coming out of it and a pan holding a pie chart" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Gabriel Hongsdusit </figcaption> </figure> </div> After reporting out how residents can sign up for local emergency alerts in each of California’s 58 counties, CalMatters and The Markup learned that in some cases, it’s harder than you’d expect. We found broken links and wrong information throughout the registration process, though two counties fixed these problems immediately after we contacted them. Some counties also had third-party sign-up pages that might make a savvy internet user question whether the website was legitimate. <figure class="wp-block-pullquote alignright"><blockquote>Cross-reference the sign-up information from various government pages because they will not always match.</blockquote></figure> Local emergency government alerts, sent via SMS, email, phone call, or app notification, are an important and often overlooked method of emergency messaging. During the 2021 Marshall Fire in Colorado, some community members <a href="https://www.9news.com/article/news/local/next/some-evacuated-marshall-fire-reverse-911-alert-emergency-alert/73-0e90f06d-044a-44ac-a1a2-fc6d8aa9ebae">did not receive evacuation alerts</a> because they had not registered for local alerts. Additionally, during the deadly 2018 Camp Fire in California, only <a href="https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/TechnicalNotes/NIST.TN.2252.pdf">40 percent of Paradise residents were signed up when local emergency alerts went out</a>.  If you’re interested in publishing a comprehensive emergency alert guide for your state, you can start with <a href="https://calmatters.org/environment/2024/08/california-emergency-alerts/">our article on CalMatters</a> (it’s free to republish if you credit us clearly, and the majority of it applies to all states), and then swap out the section titled “<a href="https://calmatters.org/environment/2024/08/california-emergency-alerts/#how-to-sign-up-for-your-countys-alerts">How to sign up for your county’s alerts</a>” with your reporting for your state.  Here’s how you can report out your state’s local emergency alert sign up process:   <h2>1. Determine which levels of government send emergency alerts in your area</h2> In some states—such as California, Colorado, and Oregon—alerts are mainly organized at the county level. But some cities, like <a href="https://emergency.lacity.gov/alerts/notifyla">Los Angeles</a> and <a href="https://www.anaheim.net/5387/Anaheim-Alert">Anaheim</a>, have independent alerting systems. In your area, alerts might also be sent through city or statewide systems, like in <a href="https://alert.ny.gov/">New York</a>. Figure out which levels of government are responsible for sending emergency alerts in your state. <h2>2. Identify the websites where people can sign-up</h2> During our reporting, we typically found local emergency alert sign-ups on the websites of either the county or the county’s office of emergency management.  Cross-reference the sign-up information from various government pages because they will not always match. We found two California counties linking to emergency alert systems on their sites that were no longer in use. A search engine query for the name of the local government, along with <code>emergency alerts</code>, will likely surface pages that contain alert information and will also show you what readers are likely to come across in their own search.  Some governments use several different notification systems with different kinds of alerts, so make sure you identify which system is specifically designed for emergency use. Many local governments in California offered Nixle or Notify Me alerts, but two counties confirmed that these notifications are not the main emergency alerting system. In California, emergency alert systems were commonly run through Everbridge, OnSolve CodeRED, Rave Mobile Safety’s Smart 911, and Genasys. These companies also showed up in many of the systems we looked into outside of California.  Since governments can always switch alert system vendors, and we expected readers to trust government-owned websites more, we directed readers to emergency alert information pages on <code>.gov</code> websites as much as possible, even if it meant readers would need to click-through to the final sign-up page run by a company. But, when registering, readers will likely be redirected to the website of a third-party company that runs the emergency alert software. <h2>3. Sign up for every alert (to test if they work)</h2> If you can make the time, it’s worth it to go through the sign-up process for local emergency alerts yourself. I, along with my colleague Ross Teixeira, signed up for alerts from every county in California to ensure we could provide readers with detailed instructions. This also meant we could check that the sign-up processes worked as intended — and some didn’t.  I ran into several broken “sign up here” links in registration portals and government pages that had information about an alert system that was no longer in use. I contacted local governments about these issues, and some resolved the problem immediately.  If you don’t have time to register for every emergency alert in your state, going through the sign-up process and following the links until you get to the page where you enter your contact information is a great way to see if there are any obstacles a reader may face when registering.  <h2>4. Be wary of statewide lookup tools</h2> <a href="https://oralert.gov/">Statewide lookup tools</a> can be a good starting point when gathering a list of sign-up pages, but don’t rely on them. California’s lookup tool, <a href="https://www.listoscalifornia.org/alerts/">Listos California</a>, was accurate for most counties, but we found several instances in which it linked to outdated information or to alert systems that were not used as a county’s primary emergency notification system. Daniel Gutiérrez, Project Manager at Listos California, told us that the agency depends on counties to update them when their emergency alert systems have changed.  <h2>5. Call the counties</h2> Reach out to specific agencies to ask questions. Counties can clarify which systems they use as their primary emergency alerting systems and provide valuable context. For example, we initially suspected it was an error that Alpine County directs community members to a Douglas County, Nev., emergency alert system. But we learned from Alpine officials that the county has an agreement to use Douglas County’s system. <h2>Finally, understand the different types of alerts</h2> The sign-up process for local emergency alerts depends on where you live, which is why we spent most of our time reporting those out. But local alerts are not the only means of alerting the public in the event of an emergency.  <a href="https://www.fema.gov/emergency-managers/practitioners/integrated-public-alert-warning-system/public/wireless-emergency-alerts">Wireless Emergency Alerts</a> (WEAs) are messages sent by authorities to all WEA-enabled devices in a target area. Most cell phones are <a href="https://www.verizon.com/support/wireless-emergency-alerts-compatible-devices/">WEA-capable devices</a> and alerts are typically enabled by default. Cell phone users can disable most WEAs except <a href="https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/wireless-emergency-alerts-wea">National Alerts</a>, which are issued by the president of the United States or the head of FEMA. Authorities do not always send WEAs, like  during the 2018 Camp Fire where officials <a href="https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/TechnicalNotes/NIST.TN.2252.pdf">relied on local alerts</a> and other means of notification like door-knocking and vehicle-mounted speakers instead. If you republish a localized version of our CalMatters article, the story will already include <a href="https://calmatters.org/environment/2024/08/california-emergency-alerts/#h-turn-on-your-phone-s-emergency-alerts" data-type="link" data-id="https://calmatters.org/environment/2024/08/california-emergency-alerts/#h-turn-on-your-phone-s-emergency-alerts">instructions</a> on checking whether alerts were enabled on readers’ phones and how they can adjust their alert settings. Managing alert preferences may be a good alternative for some community members who had previously disabled the alerts outright. The process of enabling or disabling WEAs depends on the mobile device. <hr class="wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity"/> If you have any questions or publish a local guide to emergency alert registration, let me know at <a href="mailto:natasha@themarkup.org">natasha@themarkup.org</a>. We’d love to help share your work. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,80049</guid> <pubDate>Fri, 27 Sep 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Natasha Uzcátegui-Liggett </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/09/recipe-card-emergency-alerts.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/story-recipes/2024/09/27/emergency-alerts-how-to-guide'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>How Meta Brings in Millions Off Political Violence</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/investigations/2024/10/04/how-meta-brings-in-millions-off-political-violence</link> <description>CalMatters and The Markup used Facebook’s AI model to count the millions of dollars it makes after violent news events</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>CalMatters and The Markup used Facebook’s AI model to count the millions of dollars it makes after violent news events</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/100224-TheMarkup-PoliticalViolence-Final_3200X1800_reduced-1682x946.jpg" alt="Photo illustration of a raised fist holding up crumpled up one-hundred dollar bills, a rifle and bullets" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Blake Cale </figcaption> </figure> </div> After the attempted assassination of Donald Trump in July, the merchandise started showing up on Facebook. Trump, fist in the air, face bloodied from a bullet, appeared on everything. Coffee mugs. Hawaiian shirts. Trading cards. Commemorative coins. Heart ornaments. Ads for these products used images captured at the scene by <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/14/arts/design/trump-photo-raised-fist.html">Doug Mills</a> for the New York Times and <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/07/trump-assassination-attempt-evan-vucci/679011/">Evan Vucci</a> for the Associated Press, showing Trump yelling “fight” after the shooting. The Trump campaign itself even <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ads/library/?id=513229838128846">offered some gear</a> commemorating his survival. As the Secret Service drew scrutiny and law enforcement searched for a motive, online advertisers saw a business opportunity in the moment, pumping out Facebook ads to supporters hungry for merch. <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/fb-ad-violence-1-v2-720x1168.png" alt="Facebook ad for a heart-shaped Christmas ornament showing an image of Trump after the assassination attempt" width="720" width="1168"> </figure> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/fb-ad-violence-2-v2-720x1168.png" alt="Facebook ad for 2 trading cards showing an image of Trump’s conviction photo and Trumpafter the assassination attempt, respectively" width="720" width="1168"> </figure> <div style="margin-top: 1em;"> <table> <tbody> <tr> <td colspan="2">CalMatters and The Markup ran a simple search of Meta’s Ad Library and found ads for merchandise related to Trump’s assassination attempt</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </div> <div style="margin-top: 5px;"> CalMatters and The Markup, CalMatters and The Markup </div> In the 10 weeks after the shooting, advertisers paid Meta between $593,000 and $813,000 for political ads that explicitly mentioned the assassination attempt, according to The Markup’s analysis. (Meta provides only estimates of spending and reach for ads in its database.)  Even Facebook itself <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/06/technology/myanmar-facebook.html">has acknowledged</a> that polarizing content and misinformation on its platform has incited real-life violence. An analysis by CalMatters and The Markup found that the reverse is also true: real-world violence can sometimes open new revenue opportunities for Meta. While the spending on assassination ads represents a sliver of Meta’s $100 billion-plus ad revenue, the company also builds its bottom line when tragedies like war and mass shootings occur, in the United States and beyond. After the October 7th attack on Israel last year and the country’s response in Gaza, Meta saw a major increase in dollars spent related to the conflict, according to our review. <h3>Ads mentioning Israel spiked after Oct. 7 attack</h3> Minimum spending on Meta ads related to Israel <figure> <img src="https://img.datawrapper.de/7if0Y/plain.png" alt="Bar chart of monthly ad spending from January 2022 to September 2024 showing a peak of $3.1 million in October 2023."> <figcaption> Chart: Joel Eastwood · Source: Meta </figcaption> </figure> Tech advocacy groups and others question whether Facebook should even profit from violence and whether its ability to do so violates the company’s own principles of not calling for violence. The company said advertisers often respond to current events and that ads that run on its platform are reviewed and must meet the company’s standards. If you count all of the political ads mentioning Israel since the attack through the last week of September, organizations and individuals paid Meta between $14.8 and $22.1 million dollars for ads seen between 1.5 billion and 1.7 billion times on Meta’s platforms. Meta made much less for ads mentioning Israel during the same period the year before: between $2.4 and $4 million dollars for ads that were seen between 373 million and 445 million times.  At the high end of Meta’s estimates, this was a 450 percent increase in Israel-related ad dollars for the company. (In our analysis, we converted foreign currency purchases to current U.S. dollars.)  The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a lobbying group that promotes Israel, was the major spender on ads mentioning Israel. In the six months after October 7th, its spending increased more than 300 percent over the previous six months, to between $1.8 and $2.7 million dollars, as the organization peppered Facebook and Instagram with ads defending Israel’s actions in Gaza and pressuring politicians to support the country.  As the war has roiled the region, AIPAC paid Meta about as much for ads in the 15 weeks following October 7th as the entire year before. “Our effort is directed to encouraging pro-Israel Americans to stand with our democratic ally as it battles Iranian proxies in the aftermath of the barbaric Hamas attack of October 7th,” Marshall Wittmann, a spokesperson for AIPAC, said in an emailed statement.  Other ad campaigns mentioning Israel supported different sides of the conflict. Doctors Without Borders, for example, used advertising to highlight the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Other ads defended and promoted Israel. The Christian Broadcasting Network tied the October 7th attack to a claim in an ad that Iran’s “final, deadly goal” was “to establish a modern caliphate—an Islamic-founded, tyrannical government—across the world.” Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, takes in the vast majority of its revenue <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2023/10/25/meta-earnings-record-profits-sales-as-ads-stay-robust-during-zuckerbergs-year-of-efficiency/">from targeted advertising</a>. The company tracks users online to profile their habits and, when a business or organization wants to reach them, lets those businesses pay to send ads to people who might be interested. Those ads might be tied to something perfectly wholesome, like gardening. But the company’s algorithms don’t distinguish between simple hobbies and something darker. Meta spokesperson Tracy Clayton said in an emailed statement that Meta did not ultimately profit from political violence, as advertisers broadly back away from advertising during times of strife for fear their ads will be promoted alongside news of the violence.  Clayton noted Meta’s chief financial officer recently said on an earnings call that it is “hard for us to attribute demand softness directly to any specific geopolitical event” but had seen lower ad spending “correlating with the start of the conflict” in the Middle East, and had seen similar at the start of the war in Ukraine. “Advertisers responding to current events are nothing new, and it’s seen across the media landscape, including on television, radio, and online news outlets,” Clayton said. “All ads that run on our platform must go through a review process and adhere to our advertising and community standards, and Meta offers an extra layer of transparency by making them publicly available in our Ad Library.” CalMatters and The Markup used Meta’s own tools to calculate how much Meta makes from spikes in advertising when instances of political violence happen, reviewing thousands of ads through both manual review and with the assistance of <a href="https://www.llama.com/">an AI model</a> offered by Meta itself. (We also made improvements to Meta Research’s scripts for accessing the Ad Library API, and <a href="https://github.com/the-markup/Ad-Library-API-Script-Repository/">we’re sharing our changes</a>.) To examine the assassination attempt merchandise, we ran a simple search of <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ads/library/">Meta’s Ad Library</a> for ads that mentioned “assassination,” including any in our analysis that also mentioned “Trump” and hundreds of others that didn’t mention the former president by name but were clearly related to the shooting. “First they jail him, now they try to end him,” one ad read. A conspiratorial ad for a commemorative two-dollar bill claimed “the assassination attempt was their Plan B,” while “Plan A was to make Biden abandon the presidential campaign.” Some ads used clips from the film JFK to suggest an unseen, malevolent force was at work in the shooting. Gun advocates paid for ads, using the assassination attempt as a foreboding call to action. One ad promoting a firearms safety course noted that “November is fast approaching.” A clothing business said in an ad that, since “the government can’t save you” from foreign enemies, Americans “need to be self-reliant, self-made, and self-sufficient.” “Because when those bullets zip by, you are clearly on your own,” the ad read. <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/fb-ad-violence-3-v2.png" alt="Screenshot of a Facebook ad showing an image of guns laid out over fabric with the logo for Steadfast Defense Solutions; the accompanying advertising text is a call-to-action to exercise the right to bear arms" width="896" height="1765"> <figcaption> CalMatters and The Markup found that gun advocates used the presidential assassination attempt to promote products and services on Facebook, including this advertisement for a firearms safety course. <div style="margin-top: 5px;">CalMatters and The Markup</div></figcaption></figure> Most of those ads did not appear to violate Meta’s policies, although some may have broken its <a href="https://transparency.meta.com/policies/community-standards/violence-incitement/">ban against</a> showing weapons while alleging “election-related corruption.” But even the ones that didn’t clearly violate Meta’s rules still place the company in an uncomfortable position, as the business takes in advertising dollars from posts tied to grim news cycles.  CEO Mark Zuckerberg himself commented on the first Trump assassination attempt, saying <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-07-19/mark-zuckerberg-calls-donald-trump-badass-without-endorsing-for-president">in an interview</a> that it was “one of the most badass things I’ve ever seen in my life.” Trump has now survived a second apparent assassination attempt, and Zuckerburg’s company has made millions of dollars through political advertising tied to these and other violent acts.  Katie Paul, director of the Tech Transparency Project, a nonprofit advocacy organization, said “it’s not a surprise” that ads around political violence would pop up after incidents “if Meta is not making any effort even on a good day to effectively enforce their policies.” “There’s huge problems with their advertising broadly,” she said. “They’re profiting off of a lot of harmful things, really without any sort of repercussions.”  <h2>A Trump-fueled business and cash from war</h2> Many businesses paying for the assassination ads sold pro-Trump gear before the shooting — and some might have spent a similar amount on ads if the shooting never happened. But for some, the assassination attempt effectively became an entire business strategy, according to the review of Meta advertising data. A clothing company called Red First, which offers everything from customized shirts for pet owners to flags saying “Hillary belongs in prison,” offered assassination-related merchandise through a network of pages with names like 50 Stars Nation and Red White and Blue Zone. The company, which operates in California and Vietnam, according to Meta’s required disclosures, has spent more than $1.8 million since February 2023 to promote ads through its various pages. But in the wake of the shooting, the company pivoted to merchandise around the event.  Red First’s ads were relatively innocuous compared to some that sprang up after the shooting – they promoted Trump, not the shooting, and not the idea of retaliation for it. One shirt showed an illustration of Trump, middle fingers in the air, and the words “you missed bigly.” The company has also offered Kamala Harris merchandise, recently launching a page dedicated to it as well. But the ads related to the shooting simultaneously sold products, promoted Trump, and let Meta reap advertising cash from the incident. Many of the thousands of ads posted by the company didn’t explicitly use the word “assassination,” but clearly referenced the event in other ways, using slogans like “he will overcome,” “fight fight fight,” “legends never die,” and “shooting makes me stronger.” <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/fb-ad-violence-4-v2.png" alt="Screenshot of a Facebook ad for a men’s button-up shirt with the image of Donald Trump, fist raised after the assassination attempt, set against a background of the American flag" width="896" height="1759"> <figcaption> <div style="margin-top: 5px;">CalMatters and The Markup</div></figcaption></figure> To suss out which ads were related to the shooting, we reviewed more than 4,200 ads from the company’s different pages with the assistance of a large language model <a href="https://www.llama.com/">named Llama</a>, a Meta AI model.  We programmed the model to evaluate the text of each ad to determine whether it was related to the assassination attempt, then manually reviewed hundreds of its classifications to ensure it was working as expected. After our review, we determined that more than 2,600 of those more than 4,200 ads were related to the assassination attempt. The total Red First paid to Meta in the 10 weeks after the shooting for those ads: between $473,000 and $798,000. Red First lists a phone number and street address in Southern California, but didn’t respond to phone or email, and the listed address is for a mail-opening service. <h2>The NRA and violent ads around the globe</h2> The advocacy organization the Tech Transparency Project has charted how the National Rifle Association has <a href="https://www.techtransparencyproject.org/articles/profiting-from-tragedy">paid to promote pro-gun views</a> on Meta and Google’s ad platforms after mass shootings. Despite calls from tech company executives for gun control, those companies profit from NRA spending that spikes after shootings, the group has pointed out.  After the mass school shooting in Parkland, Fla., the NRA increased its spending on Google and Facebook ads, the Tech Transparency Project noted in one report. In 2018, the year of the shooting, Meta received “more than $2 million in advertising fees from the NRA starting in May of that year,” the report found, which also found that “NRA ad spending reached its highest levels on Google and soared on Facebook” following a week of mass shootings the following year that left dozens of people dead.  <a href="https://www.techtransparencyproject.org/articles/how-facebook-profits-insurrection">Just days</a> before the January 6th insurrection, the Tech Transparency Project found that Meta hosted ads offering gun holsters and rifle accessories in far-right Facebook groups.  Internationally, Meta has often lapsed in its pledge to keep violent content off its platforms.   Meta’s ad policies forbid calling for violence. But when faced with crucial tests of its content moderation practices, the company has repeatedly failed to detect and remove inflammatory ads. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/06/technology/myanmar-facebook.html">A 2018 report</a>, commissioned by Facebook itself, found that its platform had been used to incite violence in Myanmar, and that the company hadn’t done enough to prevent it.  Alia Al Ghussain, a researcher on technology issues at Amnesty International, said that as troubling as some ads might be in English, ads in other languages may be even more likely to pass Meta’s content moderation. “In most of the non-English-speaking world, Facebook doesn’t have the resources that it needs to moderate the content on the platform effectively and safely,” she said. Despite later admitting responsibility for violence in Myanmar, the company continues to be faulted for gaps in its international moderation work. Another advocacy organization found in a test that the company approved calls for <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jun/09/facebook-hate-speech-test-fail-meta">the murder of ethnic groups in Ethiopia</a>. More recently, a similar test by <a href="https://theintercept.com/2023/11/21/facebook-ad-israel-palestine-violence/">an advocacy organization found</a> that ads explicitly calling for violence against Palestinians—a flagrant violation of Meta’s rules—were still approved to run by the company.  “If ads which are presenting a risk of stoking tension or spreading misinformation are being approved in the US, in English, it really makes me fearful for what is happening in other countries in non-English-speaking languages,” Al Ghussain said. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,80126</guid> <pubDate>Fri, 04 Oct 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Colin Lecher and Tomas Apodaca </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/100224-TheMarkup-PoliticalViolence-Final_3200X1800_reduced.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/investigations/2024/10/04/how-meta-brings-in-millions-off-political-violence'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>Launching Blacklight Query, a Tool to Scan Websites for Privacy at Scale </title> <link>https://themarkup.org/blacklight/2024/10/16/blacklight-query</link> <description>Inspect batches of websites for user-tracking tech with our new open-source command-line tool</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>Inspect batches of websites for user-tracking tech with our new open-source command-line tool</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/blacklight-query-1682x946.jpg" alt="Illustration featuring a magnifying glass positioned over multiple browser windows with a green swoosh in the background; inside the magnifying glass are two looping arrows" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Gabriel Hongsdusit </figcaption> </figure> </div> Imagine you’re a journalist investigating the privacy practices of hundreds of government websites. You hope to use <a href="https://themarkup.org/blacklight">Blacklight</a>, The Markup’s real-time digital privacy inspector. But when you visit the tool on The Markup’s website, you realize there’s a catch: you’ll have to enter each website individually, then manually download the inspection results. Hours later and a hundred URLs in, you might be wondering, “Can I do this faster?”  We hear you. We want it to be as easy as possible to use our tools. That’s why we’re releasing <a href="https://github.com/the-markup/blacklight-query">Blacklight Query,</a> an open-source command-line tool that makes it easy to quickly inspect a batch of websites with Blacklight. With Blacklight Query, you can scan whole lists of URLs from the comfort of your very own terminal, without writing any code. Simply enter your target <a href="https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/how-absolute-url-is-different-from-relative-urls/#">absolute urls</a> into a text file and run a command to generate a folder of Blacklight results. <h3>Running Blacklight Query</h3> <figure> <video poster="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/blacklight-query2-1280x722.png" preload="metadata" controls playsinline disablePictureInPicture> <source src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/video/blacklight-query-desktop/1728321361/fallback/blacklight-query-desktop.mp4" type="video/mp4"> </video> <figcaption> A video of an Integrated Development Environment showing the Blacklight Query code. The user adds URLs to the input list and runs the tool.</figcaption></figure> Blacklight Query is built on <a href="https://github.com/the-markup/blacklight-collector">Blacklight Collector</a>, the open-source engine driving Blacklight. For those familiar with Blacklight, it’s important to note that while the two tools collect the same scan data, they differ in how they report results; for example, Blacklight Query does not filter third-party cookies to determine which are advertising-related trackers. For more details on the capabilities of Blacklight Query and how it differs from The Markup’s site version of Blacklight, see its <a href="https://github.com/the-markup/blacklight-query">README</a>, <a href="https://github.com/the-markup/blacklight-collector">Blacklight Collector’s README</a>, or reach out to us at <a href="mailto:blacklight@themarkup.org">blacklight@themarkup.org</a>. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">Drop us a line</h3> User feedback is how we developed this tool, and helps us decide which direction to take Blacklight. Reach out to us at <a href="mailto:blacklight@themarkup.org">blacklight@themarkup.org</a> with suggestions, questions, or just to share how you use Blacklight. </aside> At The Markup, we believe in transparency and that everyone deserves access to our journalism and tools. We publish <a href="https://github.com/the-markup/?q=investigation&type=all&language=&sort=">the data behind our investigations</a> by default, do not track users, and have released two privacy-forward <a href="https://github.com/the-markup/split-tests">WordPress</a> <a href="https://github.com/the-markup/smol-links">plugins and</a> our <a href="https://github.com/the-markup/graphics-template">interactive graphics template</a>. Giving users ownership and insight into our tools by making our software open-source is a way for us to walk this talk. Blacklight Query is the next step on this path—a way to share what we’ve developed with our community and bring more transparency to the world of online privacy.  So draw up your list of sites, press “play,” and grab yourself a cup of coffee. The scans will be waiting for you when you return. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,80079</guid> <pubDate>Wed, 16 Oct 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Miles Hilton </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/blacklight-query.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/blacklight/2024/10/16/blacklight-query'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>California Uber and Lyft Drivers Could Get Back Pay</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/working-for-an-algorithm/2024/10/16/california-uber-and-lyft-drivers-could-get-back-pay</link> <description>The state Labor Commissioner sues to help ride-hailing drivers with wage theft that happened before Proposition 22 took effect</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>The state Labor Commissioner sues to help ride-hailing drivers with wage theft that happened before Proposition 22 took effect</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/052124_MARKUP_Prop-22_JY_CM_07-1682x946.jpg" alt="Ride-share driver and SEIU Gig Workers Union member John Mejia, center, speaks during a press conference outside of the Supreme Court of California in San Francisco on May 21, 2024. The state Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Prop. 22, a ballot initiative that allows ride-share companies, such as Uber and Lyft, to classify drivers as independent contractors." width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Ride-share driver and SEIU Gig Workers Union member John Mejia (center) speaks during a press conference outside the California Supreme Court in San Francisco on May 21, 2024. Photo by Juliana Yamada for CalMatters </figcaption> </figure> </div> Tens of thousands of California ride-hailing drivers, and possibly more, could eventually get back pay after a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision that clears the way for the state and some cities to proceed with their lawsuits against Uber and Lyft. The two companies had argued that because their drivers had signed arbitration agreements, the wage theft lawsuits that California filed against Uber and Lyft in 2020 were invalid. But last week, the nation’s highest court declined to hear the companies’ appeal. In a statement to CalMatters on Tuesday, California Labor Commissioner Lilia Garcia-Brower said her office, along with state Attorney General Rob Bonta and city attorneys from Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego, have been trying to pursue enforcement actions on behalf of the drivers for more than four years. Their lawsuits — two by the labor commissioner against each of the companies, and another by Bonta and the three cities — accuse the companies of misclassifying their workers as independent contractors; failing to pay minimum wage for all time worked; not paying for breaks, overtime and sick time; and more.  “We are ready for our day in court to obtain recovery of wages and expenses for these workers,” Garcia-Brower said.  Bonta’s office said in an email Tuesday that its case, which it also brought in 2020, can now proceed in California Superior Court: “We remain committed to defending the rights of California workers to receive the benefits and protections to which they are legally entitled.” Theane Evangelis, an attorney for Uber, said in an emailed comment after the U.S. Supreme Court decision last week that the court should have taken a federal arbitration law into consideration: “While the Supreme Court did not take this opportunity to weigh in now, it should do so in the future.” State officials filed the lawsuits before Uber, Lyft and other gig companies successfully passed a ballot measure in November 2020, exempting them from California labor law. That measure, Proposition 22, was <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/07/prop-22-california-gig-work-law-upheld/">upheld over the summer</a> by the state Supreme Court. Because Prop. 22 allows gig companies to treat drivers and delivery workers as independent contractors, the labor commissioner’s office can no longer handle wage claims filed by gig workers after the law went into effect, meaning <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/09/gig-work-california-prop-22-enforcement/">nobody at the state is enforcing the industry-backed law</a>.  But Garcia-Brower is still trying to hold the companies accountable for the pre-Prop. 22 era, though she said the process will take more time: “We are confident we can demonstrate that Uber and Lyft drivers were employees under the test that applied at the time.”  Uber had argued that <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/06/ab-5-california-uber/">that test</a>, Assembly Bill 5, which would have required the companies to treat their drivers and delivery workers as employees, was unconstitutional and unfairly targeted them. But Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court also denied the company’s petition to be heard on that issue. “Fortunately, in Proposition 22, California voters rejected AB 5,” Evangelis said.  A spokesperson for Lyft would not comment. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,80178</guid> <pubDate>Wed, 16 Oct 2024 13:18:19 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Levi Sumagaysay </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/052124_MARKUP_Prop-22_JY_CM_07.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/working-for-an-algorithm/2024/10/16/california-uber-and-lyft-drivers-could-get-back-pay'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>Sisi Wei Recognized as a Freedom of the Press Rising Star in 2024 RCFP Awards</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2024/10/17/sisi-wei-rcfp-rising-star-2024</link> <description>The awards honor the accomplishments of news and legal leaders whose work embodies the values of the First Amendment</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>The awards honor the accomplishments of news and legal leaders whose work embodies the values of the First Amendment</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/062724-Aspen-Ideas-Fest-Sisi-Wei-CM-01-1682x946.jpg" alt="Sisi Wei, right, and Dean Baquet in front of a colorful background at the Aspen Ideas Festival in June" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Sisi Wei, Chief Impact Officer at CalMatters and The Markup, speaks on an Aspen Ideas Festival panel with former New York Times executive editor and CalMatters board member Dean Baquet, left, on June 27, 2024. Nick Tininenko for The Aspen Ideas Festival </figcaption> </figure> </div> Sisi Wei was honored as the 2024 Freedom of the Press Rising Star by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press Wednesday. The award honors a rising journalist, media lawyer, or organization that has made great strides in defending freedom of the press or who has conquered significant roadblocks in the course of telling an important story. Sisi was editor-in-chief of The Markup and is now chief impact officer of the newly combined organization of CalMatters and The Markup. “This year’s honorees embody the tenacity, commitment, and courage that underpin a free press,” said Stephen J. Adler, chair of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. “Across journalism and the law, their work shows us the true power of the First Amendment to make informed democracy a reality.” The committee noted Sisi’s ability for “empowering her journalism colleagues for years, whether it was overseeing editorial teams at<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/propublica/"> ProPublica</a> to produce investigations that served the public interest; her leadership at<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/opennews/"> OpenNews</a> and the DEI Coalition to foster a more anti-racist and equitable journalism industry; or her current role at<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/calmatters/"> CalMatters</a> and<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/themarkup/"> The Markup</a>, where she is developing new ways for journalism to drive positive change.” Sisi accepted the award at the Oct. 16 ceremony at the Ziegfeld Ballroom in New York City. The committee’s inaugural Rising Star Award recipient in 2018 was <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfaeIOEtUTs">Nabiha Syed</a>, who at the time was a media lawyer at Buzzfeed News. She would go on to be CEO of The Markup and is now executive director of the Mozilla Foundation.“I think Sisi is a quiet revolutionary. She’s not a person who will be out there championing her own work. The way she affects change is by equipping other people to do it,” <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:ugcPost:7252005520046239745/">Nabiha said when the committee asked</a> her about Sisi’s honor. “[Her] work is about amplifying the best of what is around to tell the truth in the most comprehensive way.” The Markup, under Sisi’s leadership, was <a href="https://themarkup.org/inside-the-markup/2024/09/23/online-news-general-excellence-gather-community-award">recognized</a> as the best small digital newsroom in the world by the Online News Association earlier this year. And Sisi’s role as the chief impact officer of the CalMatters and The Markup allows her to now bring her impact strategy to the nearly 100-person organization, and forge new ways for journalism to be actionable, serve communities, and drive real-world impact. This impact model pioneered by Sisi helps “people understand how to take action,” said Jeremy Gilbert, Medill’s Knight Professor in Digital Media Strategy. “It’s a very different kind of journalism, but it’s not at all surprising given the nature of Sisi’s character. About her desire to change things for the better, not just tell the stories, but help the community improve itself.” Previously, Sisi was co-executive director of OpenNews and founder of the DEI Coalition, a journalism community dedicated to sharing knowledge and taking concrete action in service of a more anti-racist, equitable, and just journalism industry. She was assistant managing editor at ProPublica from 2018 to 2020, where she oversaw three editorial teams focused on news apps, interactive storytelling, and visual investigations. She also managed large, interdisciplinary investigations across the newsroom, one of which won the Pulitzer Prize for national reporting in 2020. In 2021, the International Women’s Media Foundation awarded Sisi the Gwen Ifill Award, which recognizes an outstanding woman journalist of color whose work carries forward Ifill’s legacy, especially by serving as a role model and mentor for young journalists. Congratulations to the other <a href="https://www.rcfp.org/2024-freedom-of-the-press-awards/">2024</a> Freedom of the Press award recipients included: Stephen Paul Engelberg, Editor-in-Chief at ProPublica; Maria Hinojosa, Founder and President at Futuro Media; Josie Huang, Reporter at LAist; and Mazin Sidahmed, Co-Founder at Documented. ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,80204</guid> <pubDate>Thu, 17 Oct 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Sonya Quick </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/062724-Aspen-Ideas-Fest-Sisi-Wei-CM-01.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/inside-the-markup/2024/10/17/sisi-wei-rcfp-rising-star-2024'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>Bill Would Force V.A. to Overhaul Suicide Prevention Algorithm That Favors White Men</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/impact/2024/10/28/bill-veterans-suicide-prevention-algorithm</link> <description>The legislation would require the agency to incorporate factors linked to elevated suicide risk among women veterans into its AI program</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>The legislation would require the agency to incorporate factors linked to elevated suicide risk among women veterans into its AI program</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/070124-Native-American-Veterans-MU-01-1682x946.jpg" alt="A person in ceremonial attire holds a staff and stands in front of flags during a memorial for Native American war veterans. They are wearing glasses and have braided hair, dressed in a sequined outfit with patches, including one that reads 'Never Forgotten' with an image of a military service member." width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Lori Archiquette, who served in the U.S. Army, and members of the Native American Women Warriors present the colors at the National Native American Veterans Memorial, in Washington D.C., on July 1, 2024. Photo by Tom Williams, CQ Roll Call via AP Images </figcaption> </figure> </div> The Department of Veterans Affairs would be forced to overhaul an artificial intelligence program that helps direct suicide prevention outreach under a <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/senate-bill/5210/text">bill</a> introduced late last month by Sen. Jon Tester.  Tester, a Montana Democrat who chairs the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, introduced the bill after an investigation by The Fuller Project and The Markup <a href="https://themarkup.org/news/2024/05/30/v-a-uses-a-suicide-prevention-algorithm-to-decide-who-gets-extra-help-it-favors-white-men">found</a> the department’s algorithm <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/24679669-3527-notes">prioritized White, male veterans</a>. It also gave preference to veterans who are “divorced and male” and “widowed and male” but not to any group of female veterans. Military sexual trauma and intimate partner violence, both <a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9198614/#CR48" data-type="link" data-id="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9198614/#CR48">linked</a> to elevated suicide risk among female veterans, were not taken into account. Tester’s legislation would require those factors to be incorporated within 60 days of the bill becoming law. The most recent government <a href="https://www.mentalhealth.va.gov/docs/data-sheets/2023/2023-National-Veteran-Suicide-Prevention-Annual-Report-FINAL-508.pdf">data</a> show a 24 percent increase in the suicide rate among female veterans between 2020 and 2021 — about four times the increase among male veterans during that one-year period. It was also almost 10 times greater than the 2.6% increase among women who never served in the military. “It is critically important that VA takes into account additional risk factors faced by women veterans,” Tester, the chairman of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, said in a statement. Tester, a Montana Democrat locked in a tight re-election fight that could determine control of the Senate, has touted his commitment to veterans over the course of his campaign. The VA says it is working to update the algorithm to include risk factors that disproportionately impact women independently of the proposed legislation. Agency press secretary Terrence Hayes said in an email earlier this month that the agency is weighing including pregnancy, endometriosis, ovarian cysts, intimate partner violence, and military sexual trauma, among other factors.  “VA continuously works to improve our programs,” Hayes said. “As we update the model, it will be evaluated for performance and bias before it is deployed.”  In an email, VA spokesperson Adam Farina said the agency hoped to update the algorithm in early 2025. <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/111023-Jon-Tester-AP-MU-1280x853.jpg" alt="A person dressed in denim jeans, a tucked in gray shirt and a brown jacket, stands next to a person with a denim jacket and gray baseball cap. The jacket has patches related to U.S. wars. The setting is a high school gymnasium." width="1280" height="853"> <figcaption> U.S. Sen. Jon Tester, a Democrat from Montana, speaks with a veteran at a Veterans Day event at Bigfork High School, in BigFork, Mont., on Nov. 10, 2023.<div style="margin-top: 5px;">Photo by Matthew Brown, AP Photo</div></figcaption></figure> VA officials have previously defended prioritizing White, male veterans for outreach. The suicide rate for female veterans may be rising faster, they’ve said, but the suicide rate for male veterans remains considerably higher. In an interview in May, Matthew Miller, the agency’s executive director for suicide prevention, said a history of military sexual assault or intimate partner violence were not among the 61 variables used in the algorithm because they were not among “the most powerful for us to be able to predict suicide risk.”   Veterans groups, who have pushed for the VA to update the algorithm, welcomed Tester’s legislation and said that the agency needs to move faster. “We have seen promises,” said Naomi Mathis, assistant legislative director of Disabled American Veterans, which has made improved care for female veterans a priority.  Mathis, a former Air Force staff sergeant who was deployed to Iraq, noted that <a href="https://news.va.gov/129458/creating-a-safe-space-for-women-veterans-at-va/" data-type="link" data-id="https://news.va.gov/129458/creating-a-safe-space-for-women-veterans-at-va/">in surveys</a>, a third of female veterans tell the VA that while in uniform, they endured sexual activity against their will. “You’re not seeing them,” she said. The issue of algorithmic bias has gained traction in recent years, with researchers finding many AI systems systematically favoring White men in their functions. Both President <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2023/10/30/fact-sheet-president-biden-issues-executive-order-on-safe-secure-and-trustworthy-artificial-intelligence/">Joe Biden</a> and his predecessor <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/12/08/2020-27065/promoting-the-use-of-trustworthy-artificial-intelligence-in-the-federal-government">Donald Trump</a> issued executive orders to promote transparency and accountability for AI products, a process that can be difficult given increased reliance by researchers on systems that ostensibly teach themselves and create their own processes that may not be explainable. The VA has identified <a href="https://www.research.va.gov/naii/ai-inventory.cfm">more than 100 programs</a> covered by those presidential decrees. <div style="padding-top: 1em;"> <hr> <div style="margin-top: 1em;"> Correction: Oct. 29, 2024 A previous version of a photo caption misstated where U.S. Sen John Tester holds office. Tester represents Montana. </div> </div> ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,80243</guid> <pubDate>Mon, 28 Oct 2024 08:00:00 -0400</pubDate> <dc:creator>Aaron Glantz </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/10/070124-Native-American-Veterans-MU-01.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/impact/2024/10/28/bill-veterans-suicide-prevention-algorithm'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>How Do I Protect My Privacy If I’m Seeking an Abortion?</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/the-breakdown/2024/11/14/privacy-guide-go-incognito</link> <description>A guide to keeping your plans private through every step of an abortion in any state, including Florida and South Dakota</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>A guide to keeping your plans private through every step of an abortion in any state, including Florida and South Dakota</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/11/110824-ABORTION-GUIDE-AH-TM-1682x946.jpg" alt="Photo illustration of a person surrounded by graphic elements that include the U.S. Supreme Courthouse, a hand with a gavel, a dilated eye, a search bar, a bottle with pills floating around, a pregnancy test and a diagram of a uterus; a dotted white line with two location pins runs across the composition" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> Illustration by Adriana Heldiz, CalMatters; iStock </figcaption> </figure> </div> The reelection of former president Donald Trump is almost certain to disrupt the future of reproductive rights in the U.S. The president-elect has <a href="https://apnews.com/article/trump-abortion-2024-ban-7bf06e0856b88a710c79a6eb85cffa6a">pledged</a> to leave abortion up to states but could appoint anti-abortion leaders to federal positions or begin enforcing <a href="https://www.vox.com/abortion/351678/the-comstock-act-the-long-dead-law-trump-could-use-to-ban-abortion-explained">anachronistic laws</a> that limit access. Meanwhile, measures to protect or expand abortion access on Election Day failed in Florida, Nebraska and South Dakota, and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/us/abortion-laws-roe-v-wade.html">nearly 20 other states</a> have banned or severely restricted abortion since the 2022 overturn of Roe v. Wade. <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/graphics/quick-exit_quick-exit/1731601344639/fallback.png" class="print-only" alt=""> </figure> A national abortion ban is possible under the Trump administration without congressional action, said Amanda Barrow, an attorney with the UCLA Center on Reproductive Health, Law and Policy. “An unfortunate reality is any state gains or progress that have been made would be overshadowed by the harm that could be done at the federal level,” she said. Experts say people seeking an abortion can take meaningful measures to protect their safety and privacy as they research, order medication, make appointments, recover from the procedure, and figure out how they’re going to pay for it all. They caution that everyone, including those living in a state without restrictions, may want to keep their health care decisions private. Making decisions like this is part of creating what the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit digital rights group, calls a <a href="https://ssd.eff.org/module/your-security-plan">security plan</a>, and following <a href="https://ssd.eff.org/module/your-security-plan#how-do-i-make-my-own-security-plan-where-do-i-start">their recommended process</a> can help you decide what protective measures are best for you in different scenarios. Cooper Quintin, a senior staff technologist at the nonprofit, said that “there is no one-size-fits-all privacy and security” solution for any individual. “Think about your specific situation,” he said, and then consider whether the advice you’re reading applies to you. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">Jump to Section</h3> <ul> <li><a href="#biggest-threat">The Biggest Threat To Your Privacy: The People You Tell</a></li> <li><a href="#find-accurate-information-and-avoid-misinformation">Find Accurate Information and Avoid Misinformation</a></li> <li><a href="#moving-forward-on-your-decision">Moving Forward on Your Decision</a></li> <li><a href="#after-getting-an-abortion">After Getting an Abortion</a></li> </ul> </ul> </aside> <h2>The Biggest Threat To Your Privacy: The People You Tell</h2> When people seeking abortions are scrutinized by law enforcement or the courts, it’s often because they were reported by people, not technology. In <a href="https://ifwhenhow.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/22_08_SMA-Criminalization-Research-Preliminary-Release-Findings-Brief_FINAL.pdf">a 2022 If/When/How study</a>, a majority of abortion cases were reported to law enforcement by “healthcare providers and social workers” and “friends, parents, or intimate partners.” Decide who you trust to involve in this process and limit the number of people you talk to. Before you start planning your abortion, setting up a new email address and temporary phone number can protect your research and communications. You can use these to register throwaway accounts online, contact professionals, and message with trusted friends and family. But digital communications still pose a risk. In <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/03/10/texas-abortion-lawsuit/">one Texas case</a>, a woman’s ex-husband sued her friends for allegedly helping her get abortion medication after he read old text messages on her phone. If possible, have conversations about your research and plans in person. You can’t leave a digital trail if you’re not using digital tools to communicate.  “On the consumer privacy side I would advise people to be aware that seeking and obtaining care can create a vast digital trail… that prosecutors could use to criminalize health care,” Barrow said. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">Send and Receive Secure Messages</h3> <ul> <li>Set up a new email on <a href="https://www.google.com/intl/en-US/gmail/about/">Gmail</a> or <a href="https://proton.me/mail">Proton Mail using</a> a unique, random password.</li> <li>Use Apple’s paid <a href="https://support.apple.com/en-us/102548">Hide My Email</a> service to create temporary addresses that forward email to you.</li> <li>Get a <a href="https://themarkup.org/gentle-january/2024/01/12/sign-up-for-a-simple-burner-phone-number">temporary Google Voice number</a> or a <a href="https://lifehacker.com/how-to-buy-a-burner-phone-1843905326">burner phone</a> if you’re worried about someone seeing outgoing and incoming calls on a phone bill, or if you think that your phone might be compromised.</li> <li>Use <a href="https://signal.org/">Signal</a> to send messages and make phone calls (and <a href="https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007320771-Set-and-manage-disappearing-messages">set messages to disappear</a> after a short amount of time).</li> </ul> </ul> </aside> <h2>Find Accurate Information and Avoid Misinformation</h2> Misinformation about abortion care, current laws, and available resources are commonly found online. People seeking abortions have used reliable websites like <a href="https://www.ineedana.com/">I Need An A </a>to find health care providers in their state or the <a href="https://abortionfunds.org/">National Network of Abortion Funds</a> for financial assistance.  Abortion rights advocates recommend you speak with health care professionals or the people at abortion funds for critical health information. “When you talk directly to your local abortion fund, you’re talking to someone who is a literal expert on what it means to access abortion in your community,” Oriaku Njoku, executive director of the National Network of Abortion Funds, said. Keep a couple of questions in mind when evaluating the truthfulness of something you’ve learned about abortion: Does the information come from a reliable source—an established news outlet or an established health or advocacy organization? If not, can you verify the information with one or more reliable sources? <h3>Be Careful With Google Search Results</h3> When you’re searching online for information about abortion, do not automatically trust the links that appear, especially the top results, which are often sponsored ads. Search results might link to organizations that provide abortion services, such as <a href="https://www.plannedparenthood.org/">Planned Parenthood</a> or <a href="https://www.ineedana.com/">I Need An A</a>, or they might link to crisis pregnancy centers run by anti-abortion groups. (Jump to<a href="#avoid-crisis-pregnancy-centers"> ⬇️ Avoid Crisis Pregnancy Centers</a> to learn what these centers are.) When you’re using Google, you may see an “AI Overview” at the top of your results or a “<a href="https://support.google.com/websearch/answer/9351707">featured snippet</a>” that surfaces information Google has determined to be relevant to your search. In our testing, these features sometimes gave biased, incorrect, and outdated information: <ul> <li>When The Markup and CalMatters searched for how abortion affected personal relationships, the AI Overview summarized and linked to information exclusively from anti-abortion sources.</li> <li>In another search, Google featured a snippet with outdated information about Georgia’s abortion ban. The information was correct at the source.</li> </ul> </ul> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/11/110124-ABORTION-PROTECTION-GH-TM-1280x640.jpg" alt="Two side-by-side screenshots. The left shows Google search results for the query “how many weeks pregnant can I be and get an abortion in Georgia?” with the first answer being an AI Overview that says abortion is currently banned after the detection of a fetal heartbeat. The right screenshot shows abortionfinder.org’s state guide to abortion in Georgia, which states that abortion is legal if you’re 21 weeks, 6 days pregnant or less" width="1280" height="640"> <figcaption> Google may provide conflicting or incorrect information in its website summaries. When we searched “how many weeks pregnant can I be and get an abortion in Georgia?” on Oct. 9, abortion was banned in Georgia after six weeks. The page at abortionfinder.org had the correct information, but Google’s “featured snippet” of the site was wrong.<div style="margin-top: 5px;">The Markup / CalMatters</div></figcaption></figure> After The Markup and CalMatters reached out to Google for comment, spokesperson Colette Garcia said that the snippet had been updated. “Featured snippets are dynamic and evolve as content on the web does. It can take time for our systems to recrawl a site, but once it does, the featured snippet may update,” she said. We confirmed that the featured snippet for the same search now shows the correct information about Georgia’s abortion ban. If you are reading the AI Overview, click through the 🔗 link icons to go to the original information sources, and check what you learn against at least one other reliable source. For Google’s “snippets,” click through to the links to confirm that the information is up to date. <h3>Don’t Use AI Chatbots</h3> Conversational AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Claude have given people authoritative-sounding information that’s <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/02/04/137602/this-is-how-ai-bias-really-happensand-why-its-so-hard-to-fix/">biased</a>, <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/advanced-ai-chatbots-perpetuate-racist-debunked-medical-ideas-research-rcna121438">harmful</a>, or just <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/15/24154808/ai-chatgpt-google-gemini-microsoft-copilot-hallucination-wrong">wrong</a>. If you prefer a guided, conversational format, <a href="https://www.chatwithcharley.org/">Charley </a>is a non-AI chatbot supported by a coalition of organizations that advocate for abortion access. Charley responds with pre-written, vetted answers based on your responses. <h3>Talk Anonymously to Humans</h3> If you don’t feel ready to call someone at a clinic or fund, you can anonymously call or text <a href="https://reprocare.com/">Reprocare</a> for information or support. You can also post questions to <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/abortion/">r/abortion</a> on Reddit. To stay anonymous, post from a throwaway account. (Jump to <a href="#send-and-receive-secure-messages">⬆️ Send and Receive Secure Messages</a> for tips on creating an email address or phone number that you can use to sign up for a new Reddit account.) The subreddit is moderated full-time by an abortion access advocacy organization called the <a href="https://www.abortionsquad.org/">Online Abortion Resource Squad</a>. <h3>Validate or Fact-Check Social Media</h3> Social media is one of the only places where people are publicly <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/17/us/politics/abortion-tiktok-videos.html">sharing their own experiences</a> with abortion procedures. However, social media is also a <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/facebook-instagram-anti-abortion-ads-disinformation/">well-known source of misinformation</a>. TikTok and Instagram, as well as other social media companies, have been accused of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/11/business/abortion-groups-tech-platforms.html">actively suppressing accurate information about abortion</a>, including in the years <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/meta-abortion-content-restriction/">before Roe was overturned</a>. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">How We Vetted a TikTok Account</h3> The <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@drjenniferlincoln">@drjenniferlincoln</a> account shares reproductive health advice, including <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@drjenniferlincoln/video/7382618602400238890">a pinned walk-through of ordering abortion pills</a> from <a href="http://aidaccess.org">aidaccess.org</a>. Can you trust that this person has the expertise she says she does? <ul> <li>A Google search for <code>dr jennifer lincoln obgyn</code> turns up a link to <a href="https://health.usnews.com/doctors/jennifer-lincoln-621294">this U.S. News profile</a>, which has a profile photo that matches the person in the videos and says she’s a doctor practicing in Oregon.</li> <li>A quick search of <a href="https://omb.oregon.gov/search">the Oregon Medical Board’s license database</a> (found by searching <code>medical license verification oregon</code>) shows us an active license and a specialization in obstetrics and gynecology under that name in the state.</li> <li>It’s also a good sign for her credibility that her second pinned video is <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/@drjenniferlincoln/video/7161099991153397038">an appearance with Barack Obama</a>.</li> </ul> </ul> </aside> People trying to identify accurate information about any topic can first identify the organizations they trust to have reliable information. Then, they can look for those organizations’ social media accounts to follow.  People who post about or hint that they’re looking into an abortion have faced anything from <a href="https://www.self.com/story/sharing-your-abortion-story-online">support and encouragement to harassment and cruelty</a>. Anyone looking to avoid online harassment can lock down their social media privacy settings with the free <a href="https://www.blockpartyapp.com/privacy-party/">Block Party extension</a>, and <a href="https://www.consumerreports.org/electronics/personal-information/how-to-delete-your-information-from-people-search-sites-a6926856917/">scrub their personal information</a> from people-search sites. They may also want to refrain from broadcasting their location and sharing photos, videos or screenshots that might unintentionally reveal browser tabs or background items that could reveal their plans. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">Tips on How to Browse Privately Online</h3> <ul> <li>Turn off <a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/05/how-disable-ad-id-tracking-ios-and-android-and-why-you-should-do-it-now">ad identifier tracking</a> on your phone. This ID can track your identity, habits, <a href="https://www.404media.co/inside-the-u-s-government-bought-tool-that-can-track-phones-at-abortion-clinics/">and location</a>.</li> <li>Not the only one using your computer or phone? Log out of accounts, close tabs, and regularly delete your browsing history.</li> <li>Use a privacy-focused search engine, like <a href="https://duckduckgo.com/">DuckDuckGo</a>, that doesn’t keep search logs. (Full disclosure: DuckDuckGo has <a href="https://themarkup.org/donors">donated</a> to The Markup.)</li> <li>Browse the web in <a href="https://themarkup.org/gentle-january/2024/01/18/browse-the-web-in-private-mode">“private” or incognito mode</a>.</li> <li>Use <a href="https://themarkup.org/gentle-january/2024/01/04/use-a-browser-that-blocks-tracking">a browser that protects your privacy</a>, like <a href="https://brave.com/">Brave</a> or <a href="https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browsers/mobile/focus/">Firefox Focus</a>.</li> <li>Use a public computer at a library, or ask someone you trust to find information for you.</li> <li>Beware parental control software and <a href="https://www.pcmag.com/explainers/protect-yourself-from-abuse-how-to-find-and-remove-stalkerware-on-your">stalkerware</a> on your devices, which allows someone else to monitor your internet use, phone calls, and location.</li> <li>If you find or suspect stalkerware, don’t try to circumvent it as that could raise alarms. Jump to <a href="#send-and-receive-secure-messages">⬆️ Send and Receive Secure Messages</a> for tips.</li> </ul> </ul> </aside> <h2>Know Your State’s Laws</h2> Individual state laws vary significantly. Some states do not outlaw abortion and instead require <a href="https://www.kff.org/womens-health-policy/state-indicator/mandatory-waiting-periods/?activeTab=map&currentTimeframe=0&selectedDistributions=mandatory-waiting-period&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%22%7D">waiting periods</a>, <a href="https://www.kff.org/womens-health-policy/state-indicator/ultrasound-requirements/?activeTab=map&currentTimeframe=0&selectedDistributions=state-has-any-ultrasound-requirement&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%22%7D">medically unnecessary ultrasounds</a>, or <a href="https://www.kff.org/womens-health-policy/state-indicator/parental-consentnotification/?activeTab=map&currentTimeframe=0&selectedDistributions=requires-parental-consent-notification&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%22%7D">parental consent</a> for minors.  Minors can petition a court for a <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10752100/">judicial bypass</a> of the parental notification or consent requirement. Some abortion funds can help manage the complexities around that process, said Njoku, the National Network of Abortion Funds’ executive director. Anti-abortion laws don’t typically penalize the person who receives the abortion, but that won’t necessarily protect you from <a href="https://truthout.org/articles/210-people-were-charged-with-pregnancy-related-crimes-in-year-after-roe-ended/">accusations or arrest</a>. Anyone who helps you <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2023/03/10/texas-abortion-lawsuit/">could be in legal jeopardy</a>, as well. There are also misconceptions about what is and isn’t legal. Despite <a href="https://19thnews.org/2023/10/abortion-opponents-out-of-state-care/">lawmakers in several states attempting to outlaw traveling</a> across state lines for an abortion, there’s no law that meaningfully prevents you from traveling to another state for an abortion, as of November 2024. If you live in a state where an abortion ban outlaws or severely limits access to the procedure, the greatest risks are to your health and freedom. Exceptions to bans—for the life or health of the pregnant person, for nonviable pregnancies, or for rape or incest—are common, but they are <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/01/21/us/abortion-ban-exceptions.html">often denied</a>. And, for years before Roe was overturned, states have been <a href="https://www.themarshallproject.org/2023/12/09/abortion-supreme-court-criminal-prosecution-pregnancy">prosecuting pregnant people</a> for using drugs or <a href="https://apnews.com/article/ohio-miscarriage-prosecution-brittany-watts-b8090abfb5994b8a23457b80cf3f27ce">miscarrying</a>, and encouraging <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/07/11/1107741175/texas-abortion-bounty-law">private citizens to sue</a> abortion providers and others who aid abortion patients. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">Research Abortion Laws in Your State</h3> <ul> <li><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/us/abortion-laws-roe-v-wade.html">The New York Times’ abortion ban tracker</a></li> <li><a href="https://www.abortionfinder.org/abortion-guides-by-state">AbortionFinder’s state-by-state guide</a></li> <li><a href="https://states.guttmacher.org/policies/">The Guttmacher Institute’s interactive map</a></li> <li><a href="https://www.kff.org/state-category/womens-health/abortion-policies/">KFF’s state health facts</a></li> </ul> </ul> </aside> <h2>Moving Forward on Your Decision</h2> <h3>Avoid Crisis Pregnancy Centers</h3> <a href="https://calmatters.org/health/2023/06/crisis-pregnancy-centers-california/">Crisis pregnancy centers</a> are primarily faith-based anti-abortion groups that in many instances <a href="https://revealnews.org/article/how-anti-abortion-pregnancy-centers-can-claim-to-be-medical-clinics/">pose as medical clinics</a> by offering ultrasounds and pregnancy tests as well as “abortion counseling.” Some may even be licensed as medical facilities by state health departments and employ medical doctors and nurses but do not offer full-scope reproductive health care. Nationwide, there are between two and three times more crisis pregnancy centers than facilities that provide abortions. Crisis pregnancy centers also advertise abortion support groups and retreats for people who are struggling with their decision. Since most centers are not medical clinics, they are <a href="https://revealnews.org/article/facebook-data-abortion-crisis-pregnancy-center/">not subject to medical privacy laws</a>, so anyone visiting a center may be putting their <a href="https://time.com/6189528/anti-abortion-pregnancy-centers-collect-data-investigation/">private information at increased risk</a>, especially in states where abortion is banned. Abortion rights advocates and lawmakers have long accused these centers—also known as anti-abortion centers—of coercing vulnerable people into remaining pregnant by <a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8826495/">misleading them</a> about abortion procedures and contraceptive methods.  While center supporters deny the accusations about misleading pregnant people, the centers have become a battleground for lawmakers bent on protecting abortion rights and offering services for people who live in states where abortion is banned.  <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">How to Tell Crisis Pregnancy Centers Apart From Abortion Clinics</h3> The California Department of Justice issued a <a href="https://oag.ca.gov/system/files/attachments/press-docs/Crisis%20Pregnancy%20Center%20Bulletin_0.pdf">consumer alert</a> detailing ways to determine whether a place offering reproductive health care is a medical facility or a crisis pregnancy center. Some of the questions the department suggests consumers ask are: <ul> <li>Is this a medically licensed facility?</li> <li>Are appointments and exams conducted by licensed providers, and if so, what kind of provider (nurse, doctor, etc.)?</li> <li>Does the facility perform abortions or provide referrals for abortions?</li> <li>How much does a visit cost, and do they take insurance?</li> <li>Will the facility keep your information confidential and not disclose your visit to anyone?</li> </ul> </ul> Other things the department recommends consumers look for is whether the facility offers birth control or if they try to delay scheduling appointments. Crisis pregnancy centers are often affiliated with religious organizations like Care Net, Heartbeat International and Birthright International. Many also offer “abortion pill reversal,” which is not supported by <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/12/05/785262221/safety-problems-lead-to-early-end-for-study-of-abortion-pill-reversal">rigorous peer-reviewed scientific research</a>. </aside> <h3>Obtain and Take Abortion Pills Safely, In Person or Online</h3> Most abortions in the U.S. are medication abortions done within the first 10 weeks of pregnancy using mifepristone and misoprostol. Clinical studies show these drugs are safer than many over-the-counter medications but must be prescribed by a clinician or doctor. Some states <a href="https://www.guttmacher.org/state-policy/explore/medication-abortion">only allow doctors</a> to prescribe abortion medication, but in California, a variety of primary care providers can prescribe abortion pills, including doctors, physician assistants and nurse practitioners. Prescriptions can also be obtained at abortion clinics or through <a href="https://www.plancpills.org/">virtual consultations</a> with a clinician.  In states where abortion is legal, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/cvs-walgreens-begin-dispensing-abortion-pill-this-month-nyt-2024-03-01/">CVS and Walgreens</a> fill medication abortion prescriptions. Individual pharmacy workers have the right to opt out of dispensing the pills with personal belief exemptions; however, the store must make someone available to fill prescriptions in a timely manner. In San Diego, one woman managing a miscarriage <a href="https://calmatters.org/health/2024/06/abortion-pill-cvs/">accused CVS</a> of inappropriately withholding abortion medication from her. It is also possible to <a href="https://www.plancpills.org/">mail-order</a> abortion medication. Most organizations that mail abortion medication wrap it in packaging that does not reveal the contents, and will say so on their site. In <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/health/womens-health/map-pills-medication-abortions-are-legal-rcna70490">states where abortion is not legal</a>, it is still possible to order the medication to be mailed from a state or country where providers are <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/22/health/abortion-shield-laws-telemedicine.html">shielded from repercussions</a> but there are legal risks. The <a href="https://www.reprolegalhelpline.org/">Repro Legal Helpline</a> can help with those legal questions. <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/04/11/abortion-pills-usage-symptoms-explained/">Taking both mifepristone and misoprostol</a> has been the <a href="https://www.aafp.org/pubs/afp/issues/2021/0415/p473.html">recommended standard of care for decades</a>, but as laws change throughout the U.S., some abortion providers are advising that patients alter the way they take the second pill, misoprostol, for increased privacy. Misoprostol can be taken by mouth or inserted into the vagina. If you live in an abortion-restricted state, some providers recommend only taking misoprostol by mouth because the pill may not fully dissolve in the vagina. Although it is impossible to tell the difference between bleeding and cramping caused by miscarriage or abortion symptomatically, a provider who conducts a vaginal examination may find the remains of the pill. <h3>Find Financial Help and Make Payments Without Exposing Yourself</h3> If you have health insurance, it may cover abortion, but if you’re covered by someone else’s plan, they may be notified when a claim is filed. In some states, there are ways <a href="https://www.guttmacher.org/state-policy/explore/protecting-confidentiality-individuals-insured-dependents">to preserve your privacy</a>. For example, in California, dependents on a health insurance plan can send a <a href="https://abortion.ca.gov/your-rights/your-privacy/index.html#insurance-information">confidential communications request</a> to the insurer to keep information private from the policyholder. After you’ve chosen where and how you’re going to get your abortion, the clinic will be able to give you payment options and, possibly, references to funds that can help you cover costs. If the provider doesn’t have references on hand, the <a href="https://wrrap.org/assistance-services/find-abortion-funds/">Women’s Reproductive Rights Assistance Project</a> and the <a href="https://abortionfunds.org/find-a-fund/">National Network of Abortion Funds</a> are trusted resources for finding financial assistance, though funds nationally are <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/society/perfect-storm-abortion-access/">struggling to meet demand</a>. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">Payment Security</h3> <ul> <li>Pay in cash or <a href="https://faq.usps.com/s/article/Money-Orders-The-Basics">postal money orders</a> if you can.</li> <li>If your bank statements aren’t private, use a <a href="https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/how-do-i-shop-for-buy-a-prepaid-card-en-395/">prepaid credit card</a> after making sure your provider will accept it. You may need to confirm your identity to register and use the card.</li> <li>If you use payment apps like Venmo and Cash App, educate yourself on <a href="https://www.consumerreports.org/money/digital-payments/peer-to-peer-payment-apps-comparison-a5999129619/">how they handle private information</a> and turn off <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/venmo-privacy-settings-oversharing/">public sharing</a>.</li> </ul> </ul> </aside> To pay for care, privacy experts recommend physical currencies. “Cash is king,” said Cooper Quintin, a senior staff technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “But if not cash, <a href="https://faq.usps.com/s/article/Money-Orders-The-Basics">money orders from the post office</a> are the closest … in terms of anonymity.” “If you need to pay for something online, <a href="https://www.consumerfinance.gov/ask-cfpb/how-do-i-shop-for-buy-a-prepaid-card-en-395/">prepaid credit cards</a> are probably a nice fit,” he said. Especially if “you’re in a situation where you have somebody who’s looking at your credit card statements and is not going to be OK with that.” <h3>Minimize Surveillance While Traveling</h3> Crossing state lines for reproductive health care is legal and <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-files-statement-interest-case-right-travel-access-legal-abortions">constitutionally protected</a>. (Jump to <a href="#know-your-states-laws">⬆️ Know Your State’s Laws</a> to learn more.) But even if you don’t need to visit another state for care, a travel burden can make getting an in-clinic abortion riskier.  Technology companies and law enforcement agencies have used phones and other mobile devices such as laptops and tablets to track people when they travel. Some states ban police from sharing surveillance data, but there are <a href="https://www.sfchronicle.com/politics/article/police-data-sharing-19257348.php">law enforcement agencies</a> that continue to do so. Many states also participate in medical information exchanges that make many aspects of health care cheaper and more efficient, but that also means clinicians in states where abortion is criminalized could have access to medical records without a patient’s knowledge, said Barrow, an attorney with UCLA’s Center on Reproductive Health, Law and Policy. California and Maryland are the only two states that have passed <a href="https://law.ucla.edu/academics/centers/center-reproductive-health-law-and-policy/shield-laws-reproductive-and-gender-affirming-health-care-state-law-guide">medical shield laws</a> that prevent abortion-related care from being shared on health information exchanges.  Privacy experts say there are ways to minimize the risk of traveling. According to Edward Hasbrouck, travel expert and consultant to <a href="https://papersplease.org/wp/">The Identity Project</a>, “[There are] lots of reasons you could fly to Las Vegas for a weekend. Maybe somebody’s getting married, maybe you’re going gambling. The signal is going to get lost in the noise, even if they’ve got access to that reservation data.” “If you’re traveling across state lines to get an abortion, you probably shouldn’t bring your regular cell phone with you. Get a burner phone for the purpose if you can afford it,” he said. If leaving your phone behind is not an option, digital privacy experts recommend that anyone who does not want technology companies to use or sell their location <a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/05/how-disable-ad-id-tracking-ios-and-android-and-why-you-should-do-it-now">turn off location sharing</a> on their devices. In 2021, The Markup identified <a href="https://themarkup.org/privacy/2021/09/30/theres-a-multibillion-dollar-market-for-your-phones-location-data">a minimum of 47 companies</a> that harvest, sell, or trade in mobile phone location data. This year, 404 Media reported on how U.S. law enforcement agencies purchased a tool that can <a href="https://www.404media.co/inside-the-u-s-government-bought-tool-that-can-track-phones-at-abortion-clinics/">track smartphone locations</a>, including at abortion clinics and places of worship, around the world. <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">Digital Surveillance Protection</h3> Don’t travel if you don’t have to. Instead, get abortion medication by mail. Jump to <a href="#obtain-and-take-abortion-pills-safely-in-person-or-online">⬆️ Obtain and Take Abortion Pills Safely, In Person or Online</a>. If you have to travel: <ul> <li>Ask your contact at the clinic you’ve chosen for recommendations and resources.</li> <li>Leave your phone behind, or bring a borrowed or burner phone.</li> </ul> </ul> If you can’t leave your phone behind: <ul> <li>Stop your phone from sharing your location on <a href="https://support.apple.com/en-us/102647">Apple</a> and <a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/05/how-disable-ad-id-tracking-ios-and-android-and-why-you-should-do-it-now">Android</a>.</li> <li><a href="https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/3118687">Turn off location history</a> on Google, which applies to Google Maps.</li> <li>If you’re taking a plane, train, or bus across state lines, have another reason for going to your destination.</li> </ul> </ul> If you have to drive: <ul> <li>Be aware that newer cars can be <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/31/technology/car-trackers-gps-abuse.html">tracked with apps</a>.</li> <li>Check your car for <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-find-airtags/">AirTags</a> and <a href="https://screenrant.com/check-unwanted-tile-trackers-stalking-how/">other tracking devices</a>.</li> <li>Don’t park near the abortion clinic when you arrive. Use public transportation or get a taxi and pay with cash. Do not use ride-sharing apps.</li> </ul> </ul> </aside> To lower risk from surveillance, Hasbrouck recommended that abortion-seekers avoid parking near the abortion clinic when they arrive. “It’s the last mile that’s most vulnerable” to <a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/09/automated-license-plate-readers-threaten-abortion-access-heres-how-policymakers">automated license plate readers</a> or <a href="https://sls.eff.org/technologies/cell-site-simulators-imsi-catchers">cell-site simulators</a>, Hasbrouck said.  He recommends parking elsewhere and taking public transportation, like “a metered taxi that you pay in cash,” but not Uber or Lyft because their records are “name-associated and easier to find.” If you don’t have access to a car, making the whole trip using public transportation may be your only option. That mitigates some of the pitfalls of driving a private vehicle, but it’s not really possible <a href="https://papersplease.org/wp/2024/03/18/buses-trains-and-us-domestic-travel-without-id/">to take public transportation anonymously</a>.  Car companies do <a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/03/how-figure-out-what-your-car-knows-about-you-and-opt-out-sharing-when-you-can">collect and sell location data</a> for newer model cars, while making it difficult or inconvenient <a href="https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/articles/its-official-cars-are-the-worst-product-category-we-have-ever-reviewed-for-privacy/#but-wait-theres-more">to opt out</a>. That said, Hasbrouck believes that it’s unlikely that law enforcement is getting broad access to car location data.  <h2>After Getting an Abortion</h2> <h3>Get Treatment for Complications Without Revealing Compromising Information</h3> Abortion, whether <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/06/21/abortion-procedures/">medication or procedural</a>, is a common and safe procedure, but complications are possible, and the risk is higher the longer you’ve been pregnant. Pain, excessive bleeding, and infection are uncommon but possible <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/health/reproductive-health/risks-of-abortion">complications of abortion procedures</a> that could be dangerous if untreated, and exposes you to legal consequences if you seek treatment in a state with abortion restrictions. Even women who <a href="https://apnews.com/article/ohio-miscarriage-prosecution-brittany-watts-b8090abfb5994b8a23457b80cf3f27ce">wanted pregnancies and miscarried</a> have been charged with crimes, making disposal of fetal tissue with self-managed abortions even more challenging.  <aside style="border: 1px solid #242a49; padding: 15px 20px; margin: 1em 0;"> <h3 style="margin-top: 0.5em;">What to Say During Follow-Up Care</h3> <ul> <li>You don’t have to say whether you got an abortion or took abortion medication. </li> <li>Tell your clinician that you believe you were pregnant and are now experiencing cramping and bleeding.</li> </ul> </ul> Other questions to prepare for: <ul> <li>When did you start bleeding?</li> <li>How much are you bleeding (how many pads do you fill up in an hour)?</li> <li>When was the first day of your last period?</li> <li>Have you had an ultrasound before, and if so was the pregnancy inside the uterus or outside the uterus (ectopic)?</li> <li>If you had an ultrasound, how far along was the pregnancy?</li> <li>Are you feeling dizzy or lightheaded?</li> </ul> </ul> </aside> People do not need to disclose that they’ve had an abortion in order to receive follow-up care, said Dr. Jenn Karlin, a primary care doctor who provides full-scope reproductive health care with the University of California San Francisco Health. Providers will usually take your vital signs and conduct an ultrasound. They may also draw blood to confirm whether or not you’re pregnant. “If somebody is having vaginal bleeding, there is no way a clinician can tell whether or not you have taken pills or you’re having a miscarriage without taking pills. Those two processes in your body look the same symptomatically,” Karlin said. If you’re asked directly whether you took abortion medication, you don’t have to answer that question, Karlin said. Instead, patients can tell their clinician that they believed they were pregnant and are now experiencing cramping and bleeding.  “The fact that they took pills or not if they are in a restrictive state doesn’t affect medical decision making. I would treat somebody who is having a miscarriage and somebody who took [pills] similarly whether or not I knew,” Karlin said. Certain hotlines like the <a href="https://mahotline.org/">Miscarriage & Abortion Hotline</a> are run by health professionals who can give recommendations on whether you need to be seen in person and how to prepare for in-person conversations. <h3>Discard Messages, Receipts, and Paperwork Safely</h3> If you share space or resources (like trash service) with people who you don’t want knowing about your abortion, be careful how you discard physical receipts or paperwork you’ve collected. Shred it, or separate any portion of the paperwork that has your name or other identifying information on it from the rest and throw it in a public trash receptacle. If another person may have access to your electronic devices, it’s a good idea to delete emails and messages you’ve sent and received about your abortion. Deleting an email may take two steps. <a href="https://support.google.com/mail/answer/7401">In Gmail</a>, for example, deleting an email moves it to the Trash folder where it’s still accessible for 30 days. You can permanently delete it by going into the Trash folder, selecting the message and clicking <code>Delete forever</code>. Or you can click <code>Empty Trash now</code> to destroy all the messages in your trash. Deleting a message you’ve sent or received is possible in most messaging services. <a href="https://support.apple.com/guide/iphone/delete-messages-and-attachments-iph2c9c4bfcb/ios">In Apple Messages</a>, for example, you can tap and hold on a message to get a menu, select <code>More…</code>, then tap the trash can icon to delete it. In most cases, this will delete the email or message from your devices but not from the devices of the people who sent them to you or received them from you. Some messaging services do offer <a href="https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/360007320491-Delete-messages-alerts-or-chats">“Delete for everyone”</a> (Signal) or <a href="https://www.facebook.com/help/messenger-app/194400311449172">“Unsend for everyone”</a> (Facebook Messenger) options, but it’s not possible to guarantee that the message will be deleted from everyone else’s devices. Unless you’re using an end-to-end encrypted messaging app like Signal, the company running the app may have copies of your messages in their databases that they could share with law enforcement. <h3>Find Emotional Support</h3> Most people who have had an abortion feel that it was the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953619306999?via%3Dihub">right decision</a> even if it was a difficult one, researchers have repeatedly found. But just because someone has decided that an abortion is right for them, doesn’t mean that they don’t want or need emotional support. Reproductive health advocacy groups have vetted a number of support groups for all pregnancy experiences, including miscarriage: <ul> <li>Planned Parenthood recommends free and confidential <a href="https://www.plannedparenthood.org/planned-parenthood-orange-san-bernardino/patients/miscarriage-support">support </a>options for people who have had an abortion or miscarriage, including people who are seeking religious and spiritual guidance.</li> <li>The <a href="https://www.all-options.org/find-support/talkline/">All-Options Talkline</a> is a peer-run hotline that offers support for all pregnancy-related experiences, including, abortion, miscarriage and parenting. They also serve partners and friends of people who are pregnant. Be advised that the volunteer-run line may go to voicemail and ask for a callback number. (Jump to <a href="#send-and-receive-secure-messages">⬆️ Send and Receive Secure Messages</a>.)</li> </ul> </ul> <div style="padding-top: 1em;"> <hr> <div style="margin-top: 1em;"> Clarification: Nov. 14, 2024 A previous version of this story misstated Cooper Quintin’s title. Quintin is a senior staff technologist. </div> </div> ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,80270</guid> <pubDate>Thu, 14 Nov 2024 08:00:00 -0500</pubDate> <dc:creator>Tomas Apodaca </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/11/110824-ABORTION-GUIDE-AH-TM.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/the-breakdown/2024/11/14/privacy-guide-go-incognito'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> <item> <title>Trump Wants Even Looser AI Guardrails. Why California, Despite Passing Over 20 AI Bills This Year, Might Not Push Back</title> <link>https://themarkup.org/artificial-intelligence/2024/11/21/trump-wants-even-looser-ai-guardrails-why-california-despite-passing-over-20-ai-bills-this-year-might-not-push-back</link> <description>President-elect Trump has vowed to rescind an executive order that imposed AI safeguards, and could use tech to enable mass deportations. How far will California go in the other direction?</description> <content:encoded><![CDATA[<div style="margin-bottom: 1.5em"> <h2>President-elect Trump has vowed to rescind an executive order that imposed AI safeguards, and could use tech to enable mass deportations. How far will California go in the other direction?</h2> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/03/GettyImages-2081669407_reducedsize-1682x946.jpg" alt="Photograph of a surveillance tower monitor, with a background landscape of a river and mountains" width="1682" height="946"> <figcaption class='article-caption'> A U.S. Customs and Border Protection surveillance tower monitors activity along the U.S.–Mexico border fence in Calexico, California John Moore/Getty Images </figcaption> </figure> </div> California Gov. Gavin Newsom is preparing to wage a legal war against President-elect Donald Trump, convening a special legislative session next month <a href="https://calmatters.org/politics/capitol/2024/11/gavin-newsom-special-session-trump-resistance/">to try to “Trump-proof” the state</a>. But it appears that artificial intelligence safeguards won’t initially be in the fight, even though California’s legislature had placed a major focus on AI regulations this year. Trump has promised to immediately rescind President Joe Biden’s executive order that had imposed voluntary AI guardrails on tech companies and federal agencies. The president-elect’s administration could also, immigrant advocates say, use AI tools to assist the mass deportation he has pledged to implement.  Earlier this year, California legislators passed more than <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/technology/2024/09/california-ai-safety-regulations-bills/">a dozen bills regulating artificial intelligence</a>, curbing the use of algorithms on children, limiting the use of deepfakes, and more. But Gov. Newsroom <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/2024/09/california-artificial-intelligence-bill-veto/">vetoed</a> the most ambitious — and contentious bill — that <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/bills/ca_202320240sb1047">would have required</a> testing of AI models to determine whether they would likely lead to mass death, endanger public infrastructure or enable severe cyberattacks.  There are signs, though, that AI could — in the not-so-distant future  — go from abstract concern to prominent political cudgel between the Trump administration and California’s Democratic leaders. It could be another high-profile way to challenge Trump and his newfound tech allies, some of whom have gleefully proclaimed a new, deregulated era for artificial intelligence products. “I think Newsom and the California Legislature have an opportunity to step into the gap that the federal government is leaving — to create a model environment for safe and rights-respecting technology and deployment,” said Janet Haven, executive director of the Data & Society Research Institute, a nonprofit that studies the social implications of AI and other technologies. “On the other hand, there’s no way to get around the fact that Big Tech is right there, and will be a huge factor in whatever the California Legislature and Newsom want to advance in terms of AI legislation.” <h2>Why California lawmakers and others worry about AI</h2> AI safety advocates told CalMatters they’re not necessarily sweating the apocalyptic AI nightmares imagined by some doomsayers. Instead, they are focused on how AI tools are increasingly used in healthcare, housing, the labor force, law enforcement, immigration, the military, as well as other industries and fields prone to discrimination, surveillance, and civil rights violations — because there’s evidence that such tools can be <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/technology/2024/06/face-recognition-technology-california/">unwieldy, inaccurate, and invasive</a>. “We have documentation that shows how these AI systems are likely to do all sorts of things—they’re pattern-making systems, they’re not really decision-makers, but the private sector and the public sector are using them as a substitute for decision-makers,” said Samantha Gordon, chief program officer at TechEquity. “That’s not wise.” Santa Ana Democratic Sen. Tom Umberg told CalMatters that 2024 “was a bit of a testing year” for AI bills. California lawmakers outlawed sexually explicit deepfakes and certain election-related deepfake content, required tech companies to provide free AI detection tools, <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/bills/ca_202320240ab2013?_gl=1*1dqd8b6*_gcl_au*MTUyODU0MDE4MC4xNzMxOTc0MjYz*_ga*MjA1ODMwODYxOS4xNzMxOTc0MjYz*_ga_5TKXNLE5NK*MTczMjAyNDMzNi43LjEuMTczMjAyNjk4Ni42MC4wLjA.*_ga_DX0K9PCWYH*MTczMjAyNDMzNi43LjEuMTczMjAyNjk4Ni4wLjAuMA..*_ga_GNY4L81DZE*MTczMjAyNDMzNi44LjEuMTczMjAyNjc1OS4wLjAuMA..">and stipulated that </a>tech companies must publicly release data about their AI training tools.  Gov. Newsom <a href="https://www.gov.ca.gov/2024/09/29/governor-newsom-announces-new-initiatives-to-advance-safe-and-responsible-ai-protect-californians/">ultimately signed roughly 20 AI bills into law.</a> But he also controversially vetoed <a href="https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/bills/ca_202320240sb1047?_gl=1*j5wbf3*_ga*MjA1ODMwODYxOS4xNzMxOTc0MjYz*_ga_GNY4L81DZE*MTczMTk3NDI2Mi4xLjEuMTczMTk3NDMzOC4wLjAuMA..*_gcl_au*MTUyODU0MDE4MC4xNzMxOTc0MjYz*_ga_5TKXNLE5NK*MTczMTk3NDI2Mi4xLjEuMTczMTk3NDM2OS4yOS4wLjA.*_ga_DX0K9PCWYH*MTczMTk3NDI2Mi4xLjEuMTczMTk3NDMzOC4wLjAuMA..">a major bill</a> by San Francisco Democratic Sen. Scott Wiener that would’ve instituted significant testing requirements on AI tools to make sure they avoid catastrophic outcomes. In his veto message, Newsom wrote that the bill risked curtailing innovation, but he added that he wanted to “find the appropriate path forward, including legislation and regulation.”  Wiener told CalMatters he’s working on updated legislation that could garner “broader support.” Such a bill would presumably include additional buy-in from the tech sector, which the state is <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/technology/2024/10/ca-corporate-tax-revenue-surge/">relying on for tax revenues</a>, and which has a <a href="https://calmatters.org/politics/2024/11/california-lobbying-google-big-oil/">notable lobbying presence in Sacramento</a> — <a href="https://calmatters.org/politics/capitol/2024/11/google-lobbying-california/">Google just racked up</a> the largest quarterly lobbying tab in a decade. Asked whether to expect more Big Tech lobbying against regulatory efforts in California, Palo Alto Democratic Assemblymember Marc Berman said: “It’s going to be a good time to be a lobbyist. They’re going to do very well.” Though Wiener’s AI testing bill was batted down, as were a few other noteworthy AI bills that didn’t make it out of the Legislature, California is “far and away the center of AI regulation in the U.S,” said Ashok Ayyar, a Stanford research fellow <a href="https://cyber.fsi.stanford.edu/publication/californias-sb1047-vs-eu-ai-act-comparative-analysis-ai-regulation">who co-wrote a comparative analysis</a> of Wiener’s bill against the European Union’s more comprehensive AI efforts. <h2>A lack of federal regulation and legislation</h2> California is leading on AI in large part because the competition is basically non-existent. Congress hasn’t passed meaningful AI legislation. Asked about Trump and the incoming Republican majority, San Ramon Democratic Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan said, “There isn’t much regulation to deregulate, to be honest.” Sans federal legislation, President Biden <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2023/10/30/executive-order-on-the-safe-secure-and-trustworthy-development-and-use-of-artificial-intelligence/">issued an executive order in October 2023</a> intended to place guardrails around the use of AI. The order <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/ostp/ai-bill-of-rights/">built on five policy principles</a> on the “design, use, and deployment of automated systems to protect the American public.” Biden directed federal agencies “to develop plans for how they would advance innovation in the government use of AI, but also protect against known harms and rights violations,” said Haven. Soon after Biden’s executive order, his administration created the U.S. AI Safety Institute, which is housed within the Commerce Department.  Biden’s executive order relies on tech companies, many of which are based in California, to voluntarily embrace the administration’s suggestions; it also relies on agencies like the Department of Homeland Security, which includes Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection, to <a href="https://www.dhs.gov/ai/ensuring-ai-is-used-responsibly">be transparent and honest</a> about how they’re using AI technology and not violate people’s civil rights.  Like most executive orders, Biden’s AI edict is loosely enforceable and fairly easy to reverse. Trump has already promised to repeal Biden’s executive order on day one of his term; the 2024 Republican platform argues that the executive order “hinders AI Innovation, and imposes Radical Leftwing ideas on the development of this technology.” Homeland Security and other executive branch agencies may be granted far more flexibility when Trump takes office, though advocates say the bar was already low; a<a href="https://mijente.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Automating-Deportation.pdf"> June 2024 report from the nonprofit Mijente titled “Automating Deportation”</a> argues the department hasn’t followed through on the Biden administration’s already relatively meager requests. After Trump clinched the 2024 presidential election, segments of the tech industry were jubilant about what they foresee for the AI industry—including <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/ice-surveillance-contracts-isap/">an imminent uptick in government contracts.</a> “Stick a fork in it, it’s over,” Marc Andreessen, the billionaire general partner of venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, wrote on X. “The US will be the preeminent AI superpower in the world after all.” <h2>Fully unleashed federal agencies</h2> If mass deportation of undocumented immigrants come to pass, as Trump has promised, that would require a wide variety of technologies, including AI tools. Homeland Security already employs an AI system called the Repository for Analytics in a Virtualized Environment, or RAVEn, a nine-figure government contract. The department also has access to an extensive biometric database, and monitors certain undocumented immigrants outside of detention centers via a surveillance tool that utilizes AI algorithms to try to determine whether an immigrant is likely to abscond.  “We know from Trump’s first administration that there are going to be fewer guardrails with the use of this tech, and agents will feel even more emboldened,” said Sejal Zota, co-founder and legal director of Just Futures Law, a legal advocacy group focused on immigration, criminal justice and surveillance issues. “That’s one area where we’re going to see increased AI use to support this mass deportation agenda.” To the best of Zota’s knowledge, there’s little California lawmakers or courts could do to prevent federal agencies from using AI tech against vulnerable populations, including undocumented immigrants. “Is it an issue? Absolutely, it’s an issue,” said Sen. Umberg. “What can we do about it? What can we do about federal agencies using artificial intelligence? We can’t do much.” Estimates show <a href="https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2024/09/undocumented-immigrants-california-unemployment-aid/">there are at least 1.8 million undocumented immigrants in California.</a> <figure> <img src="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/11/091824_Dreamforce_FM_CM_16-1280x853.jpg" alt="A conference hall with attendees and colorful signage related to artificial intelligence." width="1280" height="853"> <figcaption> The Dreamforce conference hosted by Salesforce in San Francisco on Sept. 18, 2024. Dreamforce is an annual tech conference attracting thousands of participants and is the largest AI event in the world, according to Salesforce. Photo by Florence Middleton for CalMatters</figcaption></figure> <h2>What if Congress acts?</h2> Another potential threat to California’s AI regulations is if the majority Republican Congress passes looser AI rules of its own, preempting state law. California lawmakers, including Assemblymember Bauer-Kahan and Sen. Umberg, said they don’t think significant AI legislation will make it to President Trump for his signature.  Congressional gridlock is one reason Sen. Wiener said he’s pursuing AI regulation in the California Legislature in the first place: “I was very clear that if (the issue) were being handled statutorily at the federal level, I’d be happy to close up shop and go home,” he said. “But it wasn’t happening, and it’s certainly not going to happen under Trump.” Not everyone believes Congress will remain stagnant on this issue, however, particularly with one party now dominant in Washington. “I wouldn’t underestimate the creativity of this incoming administration,” said Paromita Shah, executive director of Just Futures Law. Added Haven: “I think it’s possible that with a Republican trifecta, we’ll see an attempt to pass a very weak data privacy law at the federal level that preempts state law. Then it’s a game of whack-a-mole between the state legislature and the federal legislature.” <h2>California’s next steps</h2> Newsom has to date signed many AI bills but turned back others he says go too far and risk inhibiting  an industry he has sought to <a href="https://www.gov.ca.gov/2024/08/09/california-nvidia-launch-first-of-its-kind-ai-collaboration/">cultivate as a government partner</a>. A spokesperson for Newsom did not directly respond to CalMatters’ questions for this story, instead providing a statement highlighting the state’s role in shaping the future of so-called “generative AI,” a recent and innovative form of the technology behind tools like ChatGPT, DALL-E, and Midjourney: “California has led the nation in protecting against the harms of GenAI while leveraging its potential benefits,” said spokesperson Alex Stack.  President-elect Trump’s team did not respond to written questions from CalMatters. Dan Schnur, a political analyst and professor at UC Berkeley and other campuses, predicted the governor will save his political capital for other clashes. “Newsom’s incentive for strengthening his relationship with Silicon Valley is probably stronger than his need for yet one more issue to fight over with Donald Trump,” Schnur said. Florence G’Sell, a visiting professor at Stanford’s cyber policy center, cautioned Newsom against clinging to the deregulatory side of Silicon Valley. “There is really a very strong movement that wants to highlight the risks of AI, the safety questions,” G’Sell said. “If I were the governor, I wouldn’t be insensitive to this movement and the warnings.”  Lawmakers are eyeing other avenues to shore up Californians’ redresses against AI technology. Assemblymember Bauer-Kahan <a href="https://calmatters.org/economy/technology/2024/09/california-ai-safety-regulations-bills/">previously told CalMatters</a> she plans to reintroduce a stronger version of a bill, which failed to advance past the Legislature last session, to crack down on discriminatory AI practices. Another top AI priority, according to Menlo Park Democratic Sen. Josh Becker, is less sexy, but perhaps just as important: “closely monitor the implementation of this year’s regulatory framework (that we just passed),” he wrote.  California’s next AI regulatory steps were always going to be intensely analyzed. That’s even more so the case now, with Trump returning to office—a challenge state lawmakers are embracing. “One of the things that is somewhat amusing to me is when folks come to me and say, ‘Whatever you do in California is going to set the standard for the country,’ Sen. Umberg said. “As a policymaker, that’s catnip. That’s why I ran for office.” ]]></content:encoded> <guid isPermaLink="false">tag:themarkup.org,2019,80399</guid> <pubDate>Thu, 21 Nov 2024 12:32:38 -0500</pubDate> <dc:creator>Alex Shultz </dc:creator> <media:thumbnail url="https://mrkp-static-production.themarkup.org/uploads/2024/03/GettyImages-2081669407_reducedsize.jpg"/> <snf:analytics><![CDATA[<script>if (typeof fetch != 'undefined') { fetch('https://themarkup.org/202/event?event_name=smartnews&article=/artificial-intelligence/2024/11/21/trump-wants-even-looser-ai-guardrails-why-california-despite-passing-over-20-ai-bills-this-year-might-not-push-back'); }</script>]]></snf:analytics> </item> </channel> </rss>