Even though federally regulated consumer reports were already exempted from California’s ambitious new privacy law, the companies that sell them spent much of the last year engaged in an as yet unsuccessful lobbying effort to prevent individuals from opting out of sharing their own data from the firms’ databases. That’s in part because they have diversified beyond consumer reports and credit scores and into the creation of personal profiles based on online information that is less well regulated and critics of the industry call intrusive.
Category: Data Privacy
Posted inData Privacy, Data Privacy, Economy & Business, News, Public Safety, Transportation
New State Law Pits Privacy Against Free Speech, Public Records and Data Brokers
Though consumers may ask companies to delete or stop collecting data about them, the First Amendment and open-records statutes may thwart their efforts to get people-search sites to delete data after the law takes effect in January. Information brokers argue that the data they post comes from government entities and is publicly available.
Posted inData Privacy, Data Privacy, News
California Attorney General Plans Few Privacy Law Enforcement Actions, Telling Consumers to Take Violators to Court
Attorney General Xavier Becerra says his office is ill equipped to prosecute violations of the state’s landmark data-privacy law, which takes effect in January. Only a handful of the most egregious cases will be handled per year. Instead, he wants aggrieved consumers to take violators to court on their own.
Posted inCity Hall, Data Privacy, Data Privacy, Economy & Business, News, Social Justice, Technology
Writing the Rules on Data Privacy in S.F. Could Disrupt the Disrupters
As city officials this spring craft a ‘privacy-first policy’ mandated by voter-approved Proposition B, supporters hope its lofty ambitions will start to become a reality this summer. Already there are signs that the city could move to the forefront of enforcing limits on data collection and reshaping our relationship with technology companies.
Posted inData Privacy, Elections, Fall 2018 Election, Media, News, Open Government, Social Justice, Technology
S.F. Voters Want Tough Data Privacy Rules, But Obstacles Loom
Voter-approved Proposition B mandates that San Francisco create what supporters say would be the toughest data-protection policy of any U.S. city, and would go beyond California’s landmark Consumer Privacy Act. Now comes the hard part: writing the rules that will overcome legal, technical and enforcement challenges.
Posted inCampaign Finance: The Rising Cost of Winning Votes, Data Privacy, Elections, Open Government
What Don’t We Know About Campaign Finance?
The Public Press spent six months digging and sorting, and many hours talking with staff at the Ethics Commission for clarification on the best ways to find and distill the information on the 2015 elections.
Posted inData Privacy, Economy & Business, News, Technology
Testing Online Privacy Limits, OKCupid Lets Strangers Read Intimate Messages
Users on the popular dating site OKCupid.com might not be aware of it, but fellow participants have been tapped to be community moderators, who have access to private correspondence. Those with access to the “moderation” button often are checking accounts that have been flagged for possible terms of service violations. But they also get to eavesdrop on what many users assumed to be private conversations.
Posted inData Privacy, Public Safety, Social Justice
S.F. mayor signs civil rights ordinance into law
San Francisco civil rights advocates concerned about what they call domestic spying on the city’s Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim and South Asian communities are celebrating new legislation signed into law by Mayor Ed Lee. The Safe San Francisco Civil Rights Ordinance requires San Francisco Police Department officers working with the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force to be bound by local and state laws strictly governing intelligence gathering of First Amendment protected activities like religious worship.