AI

Nov 12 2019

WPF to testify before NCVHS on emerging privacy concerns in health privacy — Beyond Digitization: Artificial Intelligence, APIs, and health privacy

WPF Executive Director Pam Dixon will testify before the full committee of the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics (NCVHS) regarding emerging privacy concerns in the healthcare environment, including the role of artificial intelligence, patient authorizations, and automated access to patient health information. The NCVHS is the statutory [42 U.S.C. 242k(k)] public advisory body

Nov 06 2019

The importance of Doing No Harm: India’s plan to create a new national facial recognition database

This coming Friday, the government of India is planning to announce the winner of a Request For Proposals to create a large, national, centralized facial recognition system for law enforcement purposes. The tender for the project outlines an ambitious program of facial surveillance in India utilizing image databases that law enforcement officers could access in

Aug 19 2019

Why the new US regulatory standards for accuracy, integrity, and reliability in credit scoring models matter — a lot

For several years now, groups of stakeholders large and small and points in between have been working on ethical AI, rules for AI, privacy and explainability in AI, and more. WPF actively participated as a delegate in one of the largest international efforts, that of the OECD to write the OECD Principles on Artificial Intelligence,

Jun 11 2019

WPF Executive Director Pam Dixon to testify before US Senate on privacy, predictive analytics, and data brokers

Pam Dixon, WPF Executive Director, is testifying before the US Senate Banking Committee today on the topic of privacy, the Fair Credit Reporting Act, data brokers, and predictive analytics. “I am pleased to have the opportunity to discuss our research and what we have documented about the privacy of Americans in a predictive analytics era,”

May 06 2019

Robot Interviews: AI and the world of work

AI will alter the world of work, both in workplaces and in workplace information ecosystems. Labor experts have a term for negotiating the near and long-term effects of AI: “A fair and just transition.” These and other experts have already begun documenting the emerging changes in the workplace resulting from AI deployments. Some consequences are positive, some are deleterious. No one has a crystal ball with a perfect view of what the future may hold. That’s why a key focus now for those interested in AI and the world of work is to research and benchmark what is happening.

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.
COVID-19 and HIPAA: HHS’s Troubled Approach to Waiving Privacy and Security Rules for the Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic strained the U.S. health ecosystem in numerous ways, including putting pressure on the HIPAA privacy and security rules. The Department of Health and Human Services adjusted the privacy and security rules for the pandemic through the use of statutory and administrative HIPAA waivers. While some of the adjustments are appropriate for the emergency circumstances, there are also some meaningful and potentially unwelcome privacy and security consequences. At an appropriate time, the use of HIPAA waivers as a response to health care emergencies needs a thorough review. This report sets out the facts, identifies the issues, and proposes a roadmap for change.