The Supreme Court should strike down a class-action lawsuit claiming Facebook’s face scanning technology violates Illinois privacy law, TechFreedom and Consumer Data Industry Association wrote the high court Friday. Nimesh Patel, Adam Pezen and Carlo Licata sued in 2015, claiming the social network collects personal information from users in violation of the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act. Invasion isn’t a traditional harm that allows a private right of action unless plaintiffs show “actual harm,” TechFreedom argued. Circuit courts are split over “whether informational injuries can support standing absent real-world harm to the plaintiff,” CDIA said. An attorney for the class didn’t comment Monday.
The FCC will study availability and effectiveness of call-blocking options, said Friday's public notice. It plans to open a record in docket 17-97 and will take comment for 30 days after Federal Register publication, replies 30 days later. A declaratory ruling in June (see 1906060056) tasked the Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau with writing a June call blocking report. The report will address any consumer costs to adopting the technologies. A follow-up is due in 2021.
Most facial recognition technology algorithms show evidence of “demographic differentials,” or racial bias, the National Institute of Standards and Technology reported Thursday. For one-to-one matching, a study found higher rates of false positives for Asian and African American faces “relative to images of Caucasians,” NIST said. “While it is usually incorrect to make statements across algorithms, we found empirical evidence for the existence of demographic differentials in the majority of the face recognition algorithms we studied,” said NIST computer scientist Patrick Grother. The study evaluated 189 software algorithms from 99 developers, “a majority of the industry.”
The FTC 5-0 approved a settlement with Cambridge Analytica leaders over “allegations they used deceptive tactics to collect personal information from tens of millions of Facebook users for voter profiling and targeting,” the agency said Wednesday. Then-CEO Alexander Nix and app developer Aleksandr Kogan are prohibited from making future false or deceptive statements.
An email subscription management service settled with the FTC on allegations it misled consumers about accessing and sharing personal emails, the agency said Tuesday. The vote was 4-0-1 with Commissioner Rohit Chopra abstaining. The FTC alleged Unroll.me, which unsubscribes users from services, “falsely told consumers that it would not ‘touch’ their personal emails in order to persuade consumers to provide access to their email accounts.” However, the agency said Unroll.me “shared users’ email receipts from completed transactions with Unroll.me’s parent company, Slice Technologies.” The company didn’t comment.
With CES in Las Vegas in weeks, industry is focused on security and privacy, FCBA heard Monday. “We’ve been able to see industry all coming together” on those, said Melanie Tiano, CTIA director-cybersecurity and privacy. “We’ve seen everyone coming forward with their privacy principles.” Panelists said consensus is privacy should be addressed federally. Smart homes, smart speakers and home robots are expected to lead IoT growth in 2020, said Rachel Nemeth, CTA director-regulatory affairs. Devices are getting better at talking to each other, she said. Artificially intelligent devices like the Amazon Echo and Google Home are a category to watch, she said. “The better they get at doing what consumers want them to do, the more we see the adoption over time,” she said. “Demand is there because I keep getting called” about the IoT, said Jeffrey Marks, Nokia head-regulatory affairs, North America. “How is this private network going to work?” people ask, he said: “Do they need licensed spectrum?” Industry is ready, he said: Nokia is focused on finding trustworthy vendors and eliminating threat factors. Huawei and ZTE push “a false narrative” that without them, 5G deployment will slow, Marks said. “That’s just not true. It is going to thrive just fine.” Those two Chinese companies didn’t comment.
Facebook committed $130 million over six years for funding the company’s content oversight board, which will independently review the platform’s content moderation decisions. The initial investment will cover office space, staff and travel expenses. Future funding is at the discretion of an oversight board trust, it said Thursday.
As voice providers implement signature-based handling of asserted information using tokens/secure telephony identity revisited (Shaken/Stir) to combat robocalls, they should maintain customer service and other resources to help consumers and call originators on call labeling. That's among recommendations the FCC Consumer Advisory Committee unanimously approved Wednesday without discussion. The Caller ID Authentication Working Group also recommended the commission do studies with stakeholders, including industry and consumer groups, on what factors providers should consider in displaying caller ID information to consumers; collaborate with stakeholders to educate consumers “about how caller ID services, consumer display practices, and other measures can respond to evolving illegal and unwanted robocaller tactics”; continue evaluating how to encourage voice service providers to continue “innovating and improving caller ID services”; and develop webpages and educational campaigns using simple language for implementation. It recommended voice providers “clearly and proactively” inform consumers about caller ID services they offer. Commissioner Mike O’Rielly warned CAC about “unintended consequences” of government intervention. “Many robocalls are beneficial to the public,” he said in a recorded video. "No one should want to block” robocalls from doctors, pharmacies or schools, O’Rielly said. Chairman Ajit Pai still expects major voice providers to implement Shaken/Stir by year-end. “If they don’t, we will be taking action,” he said. He again noted “no silver bullet” exists to prevent all robocalls and “we have to take a multipronged and multistakeholder approach” (see 1907110023). The WG spent time gathering information, including researching reports of robocalls and hearing presentations from AARP, AT&T, CenturyLink, ATIS' Secure Telephone Identity Governance Authority, T-Mobile and TNS, said Michael Santorelli, the group’s co-chair, who's deemed a special government employee. The CAC meeting also featured bureau updates, including on 5G, consumer-related legislation and precision agriculture. Kristi Thompson, Enforcement Bureau Telecom Consumers Division chief, gave an update on consumer scams and “scumbag telemarketing.” Combating fraud "is not only a good idea, but it is a necessity,” she said. “If consumers no longer value their telephone voice services … that’s an existential threat to the service providers.” Noting “we tackled the cramming problems” of unapproved charges on consumer phone bills, “now a trickle of what they were,” she said there's room for hope in fighting scams: “We can succeed again.”
The connected TV advertising market is expected to exceed $7 billion in 2019, Vizio said. It launched Vizio Ads to deliver advertising across the TV maker's SmartCast platform. Ads will be available within the recently updated launch and discovery sections of SmartCast, Vizio said, along with partner streaming apps and the company's WatchFree service. It named an executive to run the business (see personals section). Vizio didn’t respond to questions on consumers' ability to opt out of ads. The company previously paid $2.2 million to settle FTC allegations it fashioned smart TVs to spy on TV owners' viewing habits (see report, Oct. 9, 2018).
Banks asked the FCC to grant Capital One a declaratory ruling that financial institutions getting an "opt-out" request from the recipient of an autodialed text message can follow up asking whether the request applies to all informational texts or a particular type. Comments posted through Tuesday in docket 18-152. The American Bankers Association said "banks often confront ambiguous expressions of intent to revoke consent," and customers could "face real harm" if they don't receive fraud alerts or data breach notifications. Consumers may partially revoke consent, the National Consumer Law Center said. The National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Unions supports "a reasonable, uniform opt-out method." Clarify the opt-out confirmation issue for all legitimate businesses, said the Association of Credit and Collection Professionals.