Congressional Testimony: What Information do Data Brokers Have on Consumers?

Pam Dixon will be testifying before the Senate Commerce Committee December 18 at 2:30 pm Eastern. The hearing, held by Senator Rockefeller, who is chairman of the committee, focuses on data brokers, what information they are collecting from consumers, and what they are doing with the information. The hearing will take place after a year-long investigation into data brokers by the Committee. “Data brokers are an invisible and powerful force in many peoples’ lives,” said Pam Dixon. “It is the right time to be shedding light on what needs to be done to give consumers the tools and controls they need to shape the digital exhaust that fuels the data broker industry, often without consumers’ knowledge or choice.” Pam Dixon will be sharing her research on data brokers and suggesting solutions to the problems a lack of regulation in the industry has created, especially regarding sensitive information like health conditions and financial status.

Hearing information:

Russell Senate Office Building

2:30 pm

For the Senate Commerce press release click here.

Posted December 18, 2013 in

New Report: Risky Analysis: Assessing and Improving AI Governance Tools

We are pleased to announce the publication of a new WPF report, “Risky Analysis: Assessing and Improving AI Governance Tools.” This report sets out a definition of AI governance tools, documents why and how these tools are critically important for trustworthy AI, and where these tools are around the world. The report also documents problems in some AI governance tools themselves, and suggests pathways to improve AI governance tools and create an evaluative environment to measure their effectiveness. AI systems should not be deployed without simultaneously evaluating the potential adverse impacts of such systems and mitigating their risks, and most of the world agrees about the need to take precautions against the threats posed. The specific tools and techniques that exist to evaluate and measure AI systems for their inclusiveness, fairness, explainability, privacy, safety and other trustworthiness issues — called in the report collectively AI governance tools – can improve such issues. While some AI governance tools provide reassurance to the public and to regulators, the tools too often lack meaningful oversight and quality assessments. Incomplete or ineffective AI governance tools can create a false sense of confidence, cause unintended problems, and generally undermine the promise of AI systems. The report contains rich background details, use cases, potential solutions to the problems discussed in the report, and a global index of AI Governance Tools.
National IDs Around the World — Interactive map

About this Data Visualization: This interactive map displays the presence...
Report: From the Filing Cabinet to the Cloud: Updating the Privacy Act of 1974

This comprehensive report and proposed bill text is focused on the Privacy Act of 1974, an important and early Federal privacy law that applies to the government sector and some contractors. The Privacy Act was written for the 1970s information era -- an era that was characterized by the use of mainframe computers and filing cabinets. Today's digital information era looks much different than the '70s: smart phones are smarter than the old mainframes, and documents are now routinely digitized and stored and perhaps even analyzed in the cloud, among many other changes. The report focuses on why the Privacy Act needs an update that will bring it into this century, and how that could look and work. This work was written by Robert Gellman, and informed by a two-year multi-stakeholder process.