Blog Post

Jul 15 2011

HIPAA Countdown

HIPAA opened for comment — The US Department of Health and Human Services has opened sections of the HIPAA rule for comments. All members of the public may comment on the proposed changes to the rule. Comments are due by August 1.

Jul 12 2011

Consumer Tip: Opt out of automatic Facebook facial recognition

Privacy tip — If you have a Facebook account and if you have ever been tagged in a photo of yourself on Facebook, we want to alert you to an important Facebook setting. Unless you have proactively changed your privacy settings, Facebook will use facial recognition tools to compare photos and make tag suggestions. When new photos that look like you have been uploaded, Facebook will suggest tags with your name. To opt out of this, in Facebook go to Account, then choose Privacy Settings from the drop down menu. Click the Customize Settings link, and then scroll down and look for the Suggest Photos of Me to Friends line. To opt out, click Edit Settings, then choose Disable on the drop down menu.

Jun 27 2011

Interview: Medical ID theft rising

Medical ID theft update — The World Privacy Forum is quoted in a Marketplace story regarding our most recent medical identity theft research. WPF wrote the first major research on medical ID theft and coined the term. Our consumer resources for detecting, preventing, and resolving the crime are located here.

Jun 08 2011

US Department of Commerce requests feedback on its new cybersecurity report

US Department of Commerce | Cybersecurity — The US Department of Commerce released a green paper on cybersecurity with recommendations for improving cybersecurity via self regulation, or voluntary codes of conduct. The report, Cybersecurity, Innovation, and the Internet Economy also contains a discussion of some privacy issues, such as the impact of data breach notification laws. Comments are due in 45 days.

May 31 2011

WPF requests more information about Ceridian data breach and the FTC complaint process

Data breach — The World Privacy Forum filed comments with the Federal Trade Commission regarding its consent decree against Ceridian regarding a substantial data breach. WPF has requested that the Commission present more facts in the case to the public, and has also requested more clarity about the FTC complaint process, noting that it is not a transparent process for the public.

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.