e dot dot dot
a mostly about the Internet blog by

December 2020
Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
   
   


Florida State Police Raid Home Of COVID Whistleblower, Point Guns At Her & Her Family, Seize All Her Computer Equipment

Furnished content.


This is insane. Earlier this year, we wrote about Rebekah Jones, the data scientist working for Florida, who put together that state's COVID-19 database (that had received widespread praise), and who was fired by the state for her failure to fake the data to make it look like Florida was handling the pandemic better than it actually was. Governor Ron DeSantis had made it clear he wanted data showing good results in order to justify reopening the state.As Jones herself explained after being fired:

I was asked by DOH leadership to manually change numbers. This was a week before the reopening plan officially kicked off into phase one. I was asked to do the analysis and present the findings about which counties met the criteria for reopening. The criteria followed more or less the White House panel's recommendations, but our epidemiology team also contributed to that as well. As soon as I presented the results, they were essentially the opposite of what they had anticipated. The whole day while we're having this kind of back and forth changing this, not showing that, the plan was being printed and stapled right in front of me. So it was very clear at that point that the science behind the supposedly science-driven plan didn't matter because the plan was already made.
Since then, Jones has been running Florida COVID Action, which is a dashboard of Florida COVID information, like the one she used to run for the state.And apparently Florida's Governor Ron DeSantis couldn't allow that to stand. This afternoon Rebekah posted a short Twitter thread, with video, showing Florida state police raiding her home. As she notes, when they asked her who else was in the home, she told them that her husband and children were upstairs, and they pulled out their guns:
This is horrifying on so many levels. Why was her home raided? Why did they pull out guns? Why did they do it after she told them that it was her children upstairs? Why did they seize all of her electronics equipment? Why are they doing any of this?Jones has been doing everything to better inform the public of what's happening in the middle of a pandemic, and this is the thanks she gets? Having her home raided by the police and having guns drawn on her children?
This is not supposed to happen. This should not happen. It is horrifying and I hope that Jones is able to retain powerful legal help to fight back against this clear violation of her civil liberties, and a clear authoritarian overreach by Governor DeSantis.Update: Since the original story broke, Florida state police claim that the search warrant was in response to someone breaching an emergency alert system and sending a group text saying: "It's time to speak up before another 17,000 people are dead. You know this is wrong. You don't have to be a part of this. Be a hero. Speak out before it's too late." The warrant claims that the breach was tied to an IP address at Jones' house. Jones has vehemently denied she had anything to do with this:
"I'm not a hacker," Jones said. She added that the language in the message that authorities said was sent was "not the way I talk," and contained errors she would not make."The number of deaths that the person used wasn't even right," Jones said. "They were actually under by about 430 deaths. I would never round down 430 deaths."


Read more here

posted at: 12:00am on 08-Dec-2020
path: /Policy | permalink | edit (requires password)

0 comments, click here to add the first



Massachusetts Poised To Become The Next State To (Temporarily) Ban Facial Recognition Tech

Furnished content.


Another state is looking to join California in banning facial recognition tech by law enforcement. Massachusetts legislators have just passed a bill that would outlaw facial recognition use in the state, following up on similar bans passed by cities within the state.

Massachusetts lawmakers have voted to pass a new police reform bill that will ban police departments and public agencies from using facial recognition technology across the state.The bill was passed by both the state’s House and Senate on Tuesday, a day after senior lawmakers announced an agreement that ended months of deadlock.
At this point, it's not a full-on ban. But it does prevent law enforcement agencies from acquiring the tech until the end of 2021, at which point legislators will discuss a complete ban or the institution of other restrictions on its use. This moratorium is part of a bigger police reform bill, one that bans chokeholds and rubber bullets while pushing for intervention by police officers if they observe another officer violating rights. Ending qualified immunity in the state is no longer on the table, though, shouted down by the state's police unions.That being said, this temporary ban is bigger than California's. California's moratorium (effective until 2022) only prevents the use of facial recognition tech in police body cameras. Everything else is still allowed for the time being. The moratorium in Massachusetts would prevent law enforcement agencies from acquiring any version of this tech.But it would allow law enforcement to run searches through the state's motor vehicle database. The state DMV will still be allowed to use biometrics to verify individuals seeking vehicle licenses and other permits. However, if a law enforcement agency utilizes this option (which is limited to warrant execution and other "immediate danger of death or serious injury" situations), an affidavit justifying the search must be filed with the court and the person targeted by the search notified within 72 hours. The DMV is also obligated to publish periodic reports on searches run by law enforcement agencies.But there may be some opposition ahead. Even though this has passed both legislative branches, it still needs the governor's signature. Last year, Governor Charlie Baker stated he wasn't interested in regulating this tech at the state level, giving this bizarre response to journalists.
My understanding is most of that’s regulated at this point at the federal level,” Baker told reporters Monday, following a Herald report on the spread of the technology and lack of controls. “Whether or not it should be regulated at the state level is something we’ve had conversations about, but they’re not to the point where we’d be ready to file legislation.”
The tech is very definitely not regulated at the federal level. The only legislation targeting this tech has been passed by cities and states. Congress may have expressed an interest in taking on the tech, but nothing has made its way to the president's desk, much less made it out of committee. Federal agencies -- especially those operating under the DHS's unwatchful eye -- are big fans of biometric surveillance and very few federal legislators seem interested in tempering their acquisition and deployment of the tech.The tech remains highly problematic and under-regulated. If this bill becomes law, it will at least force the state of Massachusetts to confront these issues before moving forward with tech acquisitions. A little more scrutiny might go a long way.

Read more here

posted at: 12:00am on 08-Dec-2020
path: /Policy | permalink | edit (requires password)

0 comments, click here to add the first



December 2020
Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
   
   







RSS (site)  RSS (path)

ATOM (site)  ATOM (path)

Categories
 - blog home

 - Announcements  (0)
 - Annoyances  (0)
 - Career_Advice  (0)
 - Domains  (0)
 - Downloads  (3)
 - Ecommerce  (0)
 - Fitness  (0)
 - Home_and_Garden  (0)
     - Cooking  (0)
     - Tools  (0)
 - Humor  (0)
 - Notices  (0)
 - Observations  (1)
 - Oddities  (2)
 - Online_Marketing  (0)
     - Affiliates  (1)
     - Merchants  (1)
 - Policy  (3743)
 - Programming  (0)
     - Bookmarklets  (1)
     - Browsers  (1)
     - DHTML  (0)
     - Javascript  (3)
     - PHP  (0)
     - PayPal  (1)
     - Perl  (37)
          - blosxom  (0)
     - Unidata_Universe  (22)
 - Random_Advice  (1)
 - Reading  (0)
     - Books  (0)
     - Ebooks  (0)
     - Magazines  (0)
     - Online_Articles  (5)
 - Resume_or_CV  (1)
 - Reviews  (2)
 - Rhode_Island_USA  (0)
     - Providence  (1)
 - Shop  (0)
 - Sports  (0)
     - Football  (0)
          - Cowboys  (0)
          - Patriots  (0)
     - Futbol  (0)
          - The_Rest  (0)
          - USA  (0)
 - Technology  (1049)
 - Windows  (1)
 - Woodworking  (0)


Archives
 -2024  March  (164)
 -2024  February  (168)
 -2024  January  (146)
 -2023  December  (140)
 -2023  November  (174)
 -2023  October  (156)
 -2023  September  (161)
 -2023  August  (49)
 -2023  July  (40)
 -2023  June  (44)
 -2023  May  (45)
 -2023  April  (45)
 -2023  March  (53)
 -2023  February  (40)


My Sites

 - Millennium3Publishing.com

 - SponsorWorks.net

 - ListBug.com

 - TextEx.net

 - FindAdsHere.com

 - VisitLater.com