Anyone who wants to believe in it, finds their priests: dataism. Last summer, I read the book entitled ‘Friction’ by philosopher Miriam Rasch. She defines dataism as the sacred belief in data as an explanatory model for reality and as … Read More
Not only the Norwegian data privacy authority has raised the red flag against Google Workspace. Also the Dutch authorities are strugling with lack of compliance from the tech giant. A report made to the Dutch government actually makes it impossible … Read More
By Sille Obelitz Søe and Jens-Erik Mai “What does it mean to be human?” is perhaps the most fundamental and important question we can ask at the moment. This might sound odd in a time where the world is fighting … Read More
There is a growing number of people, organisations and companies around the world working to make up an ecosystem that generates alternative futures to big tech companies’ massive accumulation of data and unilateral control. The US-based non-profit organisation, Mozilla, who’s … Read More
Algorithms are picking up on how we feel. In China, emotion recognition technology is now being used to monitor students in the education system. In the US, advertisers are using emotion recognition technology to measure the emotional impact of commercials, … Read More
Dataethics.eu and Danish Society of Engineers’ Working Group on Ethics and Technology have published the report Online games gamble with children’s data. The report sheds light on a very complicated, opaque ecosystem of gametech players, who all play a more … Read More
In a new study that digs into the meaning of data ethics in the context of the power dynamics of AI and big data, DataEthics.eu’s co-founder Gry Hasselbalch argues that data ethics has to become more than just a moral … Read More
Despite clear age rules many games are ignoring the fact that children are using their services. Children have a right to digital privacy and protection against advertisments (especially personalised) but they are not protected at all in most games. This … Read More
China’s Social Credit System (SoCS) is still not a unified standard system used all over China as expected in 2020. What has been established is a policy framework that encompasses a large number of initiatives, both private and public and … Read More
Tilly Lockey lost both her hands, when she was 15 months old due to complications from infection. When she was two, she got prostheses, and since 2019 she has had bionic arms from Open Bionics using the newest and most advanced tech, so she can move her … Read More
Today it’s official: The General comment No. 25 (2021) on children’s rights in relation to the digital environment that was adopted earlier this year has been released for everyone to read. The Best Interests of the Child It sets out how children’s … Read More
In March, four EU leaders, Angela Merkel (Germany), Mette Frederiksen (Denmark), Sanna Marin (Finland) and Kaja Kallas (Estonia), wrote a letter encouraging the European Commission President to support digital sovereignty in Europe. In the letter they call for EU-based data … Read More
Nicole Broch Larsen is a professional golfer. She uses data to optimize her game, but there are downsides to datafying the the sport. Both in terms of human skills and the risk of abuse of sensitive personal data. The tools … Read More
Privacy concerns some of the most personal aspects of our lives, for instance about our health, personal habits, financial situation. It is tempting to think of privacy as solely an individual affair. But as philosopher Carissa Véliz has argued, privacy is … Read More
Since 2013 Google has funded European journalism with more than 200 million euros. This makes Google the sovereign patron of European journalism. The ambitious study Google, the media patron How the digital giant ensnares journalism from 2020 documents Google’s role as patron. … Read More
Google has read the writing on the wall. With Firefox and Safari blocking tracking cookies by default and privacy legislation continuing to evolve, Google, through the Chromium project, has been developing a new suite of tools to preserve their business … Read More
With small new engaging platforms it is wise to take a closer look on how they manage to safeguard our privacy and protect our data. The invite-only live-audio SoMe platform Clubhouse has passed the 10 million users landmark during its first year in action. So should you feel left out in the cold in case … Read More
Interview. Today, consumers don’t get a fair share of the value from their data. Data silos restrict the accessibility of data for consumers and other business and therefore restrict the potential to drive innovation and new services and experiences for consumers. Lack … Read More
A vaccine passport stands for many as the door to the promised land – as the place where we can gather with families and friends again without restrictions, travel in the world, go to parties and festivals, and take advantage of all the other cultural offerings we … Read More
As mange countries in the world are gearing up to protect children online, new technical solutions are introduced. One of the latest examples is the technical solution ConsentCheq that makes it possible to meet the California Consumer Privacy Act’s (CCPA) … Read More
As a wave of digitisation sweeps Europe, algorithms, and artificial intelligence (AI) rapidly become an integral part of our daily lives. Public authorities thus use algorithms to optimise their processes, improve the accessibility to their services, or manage public spaces. This development stresses the need for ensuring that algorithms in public services must respect the same principles of responsibility, accountability, transparency, and security … Read More
Brain computer interfaces will not only transform the way we treat spine and brain injuries. This technology has the potential to influence how we define a human being and how we interact with each other. Despite the fact that these … Read More
For 50 years, the Swedish Data Protection Agency has been called the Data Inspectorate. But in early 2021, they changed their name to Swedish Authority for Privacy Protection (IMY). In this way, the supervisory authority emphasises that they focus on the … Read More
At present, vaccination status does not offer clear or conclusive evidence about any individual’s risk to others via transmission. Without that, it cannot be a robust basis for risk-based decision making, and therefore any roll out of a digital passport … Read More
Apple is taking another step towards giving users control over their data and obtain privacy. From this spring your iPhone’s IOS will force all apps to ask you to opt in, if you are okay with being tracked. The current … Read More
Amazon Prime’s design feature manipulates users into sticking with paid memberships, claims the Norwegian Consumer Council, and that is not okay. Therefore they have filed a legal complaint to the Consumer Protection Authority saying that Amazon puts obstacles in the way of … Read More
So far 2021 has been a year with growth in the use of privacy-focused apps. The milestone of Duck Duck Go Last week the privacy-focused search engine Duck Duck Go reached a major milestone when it recorded its first-ever day with … Read More
Google is about to take over many elementary schools in Europe with its Chromebooks and the app collection in Google Suit for Education. The data monopoly sits on about half of the elementary schools in Denmark, and the second largest … Read More
Published 14-01-2021 at Nordic Engineers “Ditch the algorithm!” became one of the battle cries of 2020, encapsulating the fear that humanity is being subordinated to technology[1]. At the same time, the rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) systems is increasingly … Read More
We have recently seen many examples of the danger of misinformation distributed on social media (SoMe). The COVID-19 pandemic has been accompanied by a misinformation pandemic, including conspiracy theories questioning the existence of this deadly disease, anti-mask propaganda, and claims … Read More
When Sir Tim Berners-Lee created the world wide web, he had a dream; he wanted to create a network where information could be shared free, globally and available for all. We might feel like this exists today, but Tim Berners-Lee’s … Read More
The Norwegian Data Protection Agency has introduced a regulatory sandbox following a British model. The sandbox establishes a project environment for AI, where private and public companies can get free guidance on personal data protection. The Norwegian sandbox aims at … Read More
The German EU presidency of the Council hosted an online conference on Monday that stressed the need for a much stronger focus on fundamental rights in the digital age and especially when jumping to AI as a fix to ensure … Read More
Three Norwegian municipalities are breaking the law in their use of Google Suit for Education (GSFE) and thus get a warning from the Data Protection Authority (DPA). It is very hard – if possible at all – to actually use … Read More
A new paper ‘Democratic Data: A Relational Theory For Data Governance’ shows us that you can donate your data and this can affect others negatively. Data about you dot now only affect you. Data about you affects others as well. … Read More
Many people like YouTube recommendations, but they can also lead some into extremism or have other serious consequences, and YouTube does have a history of recommending harmful content — from pandemic conspiracies to political disinformation — to its users, even … Read More
Abstract This article investigates a moment of the big data age in which artificial intelligence became a fixed point of global negotiations between different interests in data. In particular, it traces and explicates cultural positioning as an interest in the … Read More
Either we stick to the behavioural advertising in its current form (being illegal according to the Belgian data authorities), where detailed data about us are tracked, profiled targeted and shared, or we will have to pay for content. This is … Read More
By Kasper Holst Hansen After 13 years of working with EduLab (which I founded) and MatematikFessor the time had come to sell the company. I had no prior experience with selling a company but understood that all things need to be in order. The value of having order in our finances … Read More
Photo by fauxels from Pexels We are used to having big private companies be in control of our personal data in exchange for using their services. But what if we could be in control our data and earn the profit … Read More
EU is hoping that we can create unicorns. It can be much more valuable to have a higher number of smaller, more specialized companies, whose systems are interoperable in stead of promoting a company culture who is mainly growing by … Read More
The Forum on Information and Democracy has published a report of on how to fix infodemics. Based on more than 100 contributions from international experts, it offers 250 recommendations on how to rein in a phenomenon that threatens democracies and … Read More
Every time we click and swipe our way through the internet, our data is being collected in ways that are not visible or incomprehensible for us – the users. Data sits in all the veins of digital services and is … Read More
Academic AI researchers receive quite extensive financial support from big tech, according to several articles and studies. 58% of faculty at four prominent universities have received grants, fellowship, or other financial support from Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, Nividia, … Read More
Hosted by the Institute of Future and Innovation Studies at John Cabot University in collaboration with the Festival della Diplomazia. In recent years, public interest in the ethical implications of AI has increased significantly, as it has the growing consensus … Read More
“Dear Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon and Microsoft, We represent a diverse coalition of interest groups and individuals calling on you to end targeted, ‘behavioural’ advertising to children on your sites, and the tracking which underpins it”. These are the opening … Read More
In Denmark, when you turn 65, you’re supposed to get a visit from the municipality if you need it. The purpose is to assess your living situation and find out if you need any help, be it home care or preventive programs from the public authorities. When you … Read More
Data ethics are on the agenda in an increasing number of organisations. This means that consideration is given to the ethical justification of how data and personal data are handled. In addition to the legal frameworks, the desirability of data … Read More
With a so-called Child YouTuber Law, France are showing the way towards protecting our children from digital child labour. Child influencers – often run by their parents – is a growing phenonomen. For years children have been protected by law towards child labour within legislation worldwide. UN … Read More
Analysis. Products and services, which try to embed privacy and work ethically responsible with data, are finally progressing. It is uphill to compete with monopoly tech’s convenient and dirt cheap or ‘free’ products, but more and more individuals seem to … Read More
Ethics procedures are a core component of any AI innovation and research. It is essential that we do not undermine this during the Covid19 crisis. Europe still needs to deliver on its “Trustworthy AI agenda”. Most of us know the … Read More
Trained birds, especially pigeons, have a long history in espionage practices. A Dutch Company, called the Drone Bird Company, found a new way of using birds, well not actual birds, in order to get an overview of a situation or … Read More
US antitrust authorities have slept for at least a decade when it come to tech. But something may be looming. The US Justice Department might be on its way with cases against two monopolies, Google and Amazon. Meanwhile, both the … Read More
Written by David Oehlenschläger, trauma psychologist and Mie Oehlenschläger, external lecturer, New Media. Recently news media reported a story about a suicide video that was displayed on several social media platforms such as TikTok and Facebook. The video was originally … Read More
Children interact with or are impacted by AI systems that are not designed for them, and current policies do not address this, according to a new UNICEF draft policy guidance report on children and AI. AI systems are increasingly being … Read More
Michele Gilman a professor of Law at the University of Baltimore School of Law has written a report for poverty lawyers explaining the consequences of data-centric technologies in America. The report covers seven areas were algorithms can cause discrimination and … Read More
New draft guidelines from the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) on social media are clarifying roles and responsibilities for platforms, users and advertisers. The draft guidelines are open for public consultation until October 19, 2020 and can have far reaching … Read More
The Chinese are coming. Beware! The Trump government is warning everybody against digital services like TikTok, because it is, he says, stealing American data. What he does not say is that he and American big tech are deeply worried about … Read More
The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child is currently drafting a general comment on children’s rights in relation to the digital environment. The document falls under the Rights of the Child – the most ratified human rights treaty in … Read More
Sitra, the Finnish independent innovation fund, who invests in a fair and sustainable future, believes that Europe must work more fiercely towards fair data economy, and that GDPR is not enough. In a new report “On the trail of personal … Read More
China has risen as a key player in the digital domain. And it uses its influence to promote digital authoritarianism, which presents security, privacy, and human rights concerns for the free world. China is working to undermine our democratic institutions … Read More
The final Assessment List for Trustworthy AI (ALTAI) presented by the European High Level Expert Group on AI is intended for self-evaluation purposes. It is based on the initial assessment list outlined in the Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI created … Read More
Facebook’s decisions over the last nine months have resulted in serious setbacks for civil rights and the prioritisation of free expression over all other values, such as equality and non-discrimination, is deeply troubling to the auditors. Further on privacy, groups … Read More
Massive Online Meetings (MOMs) have many new advantages but also many new tracking possibilities. Participants can potentially be tracked constantly through the whole duration of the event. By Ferenc Borondics & Jesse McCrosky The COVID-19 pandemic and our collective response … Read More
At the end of May 202, the company Cleardox held a webinar looking into GDPR two years after. Jakob Kamby from Kammeradvokaten, Allan Frank from the Danish DPA, Stephen Alstrup, Superwiz/Copenhagen Univerisity and Pernille Tranberg, DataEthics.eu, participated. Here is the … Read More
Paper. In the current data economy, very few people gain opportunities to control significant amounts of personal data. Control over personal data assets is distributed very unequally across social positions. Most users of are only able to provide consent for … Read More
The internet was originally designed without an identity layer, which means, that even tough two devices can connect and interact online, it is difficult to guarantee that the one you are interacting with is who they claim to be. It … Read More
During the last year the video sharing platform TikTok has become very popular. And according to Euronews TikTok’s popularity spiked during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the app being the second-most installed application in April 2020 worldwide, with more than 107 … Read More
The World Federation of Advertisers, WFA, has launched a guide to its members on how they can go the data ethics way. It comes at a time where doing the right thing is becoming more of a must have that … Read More
Social media have a lot of issues to resolve, must live up to all laws and remove content that is unlawful. But social media is not traditional media, who is regulated by media law and press ethics. That is why … Read More
Julia Sommer attended a webinar recently (May 15th 2020) discussing the Corona app. She summarised it in scribing. Click on the picture or the link under the picture to enlarge. Overview Sune Lehmann Rikke Frank Jørgensen Stinus Lindgren & Conclusion … Read More
March 16th 2020 The Netherlands went into a semi-lock down. Schools and universities had to close because of the strict regulations to prevent the Covid-19 from spreading. Universities had to make a quick transition to digital alternatives in order to … Read More
The inversion of democracy is a slow process of getting used to less and less freedom. In moments of crisis, there is a big risk that we make choices about adopting public health tech too hastily and without considerations as … Read More
A new paper presents evidence to support a potential antitrust case against Google based on its apparent dominant position and alleged anti-competitive conduct in the digital advertising market in the US. It alleges that Google has used it … Read More
While isolation preserves us from the pandemic, it makes us especially vulnerable to the effects of the infodemic. In a context that has brought our offline lives to the online wires, we are all exposed to being constantly tested by … Read More
By Lara Friedel, Bella Hintergard, Javier Lede Intro Algorithms are progressively shaping more and more aspects of our lives. The evolution of this issue leads the need to raise an urgent debate on the ethical use of data. We are … Read More
DataEthics.eu’s white paper on AI in public procurement has been forwarded to EU policymakers. First response we have received is from the European Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton who writes (26th of May 2020): “..I was very pleased to … Read More
Public Institutions Can Lead the Way to Trustworthy AI Many European public institutions have installed or want to install a chatbot on their website to serve their citizens 24/7. But which service provider should they chose? There are a whole … Read More
Access Now, an international non-profit group that advocates for human rights online, have formulated 26 human right-centered recommendations for content governance, based on ideals of freedom, openness and democratic values. The following is an abstract of the problems identified by … Read More
By Francesco Lapenta, professor and director of John Cabot University Institute of Future and Innovation Studies in Rome Analysis. The early response to a unique, but not unprecedented or unpredictable global biological crisis has been chaotic, profoundly un-collaborative and characterized … Read More
Over a 100 years ago, the US company Pullman produced railroad cars and wanted to place a factory 10 miles outside the city center. It built a city around the factory premises, where all the workers could live and thus … Read More
Over the last couple of years, many companies, institutions, governments and ethicists have proposed their own principles for the development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in an ethical way. Most of the guidelines include principles about fairness, accountability and transparency, but … Read More
A lot of confusion about the term’s roots, history and disciplinary approaches is clouding the current debate. Is it “ethics washing”? Is it misappropriation of a term? Who “owns” the term? The popularity of the term “data ethics” exploded in … Read More
The Danish ARKEN Museum of Modern Art is not doing what many others are doing these days. Choosing new digital tools out of convenience and speediness. Arken has had ethical thoughts before choosing their new webinar tool in their digital … Read More
(updates 29th April and 6th July below) Because of the Corona crisis, many are advised to stay at home and to avoid physical contact as much as possible. This means that we must avoid meeting up with co-workers, voluntary organisations … Read More
This article is written by guest writer Annesophie Eve Hørlyk based on her master’s thesis that was published in the IT University of Copenhagen in January 2020. Informed consent is one of the primary means to protect internet users’ autonomy … Read More
Yuval Harari, historian and author of Sapiens and Homo Deus, has written an opinion in The Financial Times and everybody, especially politicians, should read it, as it is vital that we do not give up on our democratic rights even … Read More
The internet was never designed with the best interest of the child in mind. Now it is time to fix it! This seems to be the philosophy behind to law proposals in the US and the UK. In the spring … Read More
Is it okay to participate in the criticized ad tech system, when your service is dealing with such sensitive data as women’s fertility data? For the German-founded privacy-focused start-up Clue, it is a constant balance between being user-friendly and private … Read More
Did you know that the Spanish Comunidad Valenciana is the only European region that protects their student’s privacy in public schools through open source tools and platforms? Many other schools in Europe are using big tech mainly from the US … Read More
Are you doing webinars? Here are advice on how to get a good start (and ethical tools to use). Many still feel uncomfortable with organizing webinars and prefer physical events. And agreed, there are things you cannot do in a … Read More
Review. Change for the better is difficult. But there is a good chance that it will become easier after reading the “The Ethical Design Handbook” by Trine Falbe Kim Andersen and Martin Michael Frederiksen. Read it if you are in … Read More
In the paper Owning Ethics: Corporate Logics, Silicon Valley, and the Institutionalization of Ethics by Jacob Metcalf, Emanuel Moss and Danah Boyd the authors investigates the role and pitfalls of ethics in big cooperate firms in Silicon Valley and how … Read More
The strategy is ambitious on advancing the European AI uptake and taking back control over a European data space. But it lacks ambition when creating the conditions for a thriving ethical and trustworthy AI and data space. On 19th February … Read More
In a town in the southern part of the Netherlands a futuristic neighbourhood is about to be built. ‘BrainPort SmartDistrict’ will be a neighbourhood for citizens of the future. In this analysis I explain how the project was criticized for not embedding privacy and putting the residents at the center – and then how the project changed focus. But despite a new focus, there are still many ethical questions to be asked and discussed – the most important being: It is desired? … Read More
One of the main role models within the new data ethics era might end up being the Swedish multinational Ingka Group, the strategic partner to IKEA. The company presented its thoughts for the first time at the World Economic Forum … Read More
Over the past couple of years experts have been pointing to ‘data trusts’ as a way to make a more democratic and fair infrastructure. Report after report have pointed to the need of trying this out. Despite wide endorsement of … Read More
If we want to use personal data to help humans and societies thrive, we need to make de-anonymisation illegal and let independent third parties into machine rooms to audit anonymisation processes. As it is today, we get more and more … Read More
“Big Tech manipulates Academia in order to avoid regulation”, claims Rodrigo Ochigame in a recent article in The Intercept. But maybe the headline ought to be: “Big Tech buys Academia in order to avoid regulation”? It started back in 2016 … Read More
