| Internet Governance Amazon Filing to FTC Reveals Breadth of the Commission’s Investigation into the Company: The recent filing suggests that the Commission’s investigation into whether Amazon deceived users into subscribing to services including Amazon Prime has expanded to over a half-dozen of the company’s other services and involves aggressive requests for information, including the testimony of founder Jeff Bezos and CEO Andy Jassy. |
| Privacy Report Suggests Weak Privacy Practices for Period-Tracking Apps: In a new analysis, Mozilla gave 18 of the 25 most popular period- or pregnancy-tracking apps and wearables privacy warning labels due to concerns about the services’ data collection and sharing practices. Similarly, a company under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission for allegedly brokering reproductive health data has sued the Commission for overreach, and argues that its “Privacy Block” feature that purportedly “removes health services location data” from its data marketplace resolves the Commission’s concerns. |
| Information Security and Cyberthreats Now-Patched Vulnerability in Amazon Ring App Exposed Personal and Device Data: The vulnerability would have allowed hackers to harvest personal data and device data, including recordings, which could be automatically analyzed to extract further information. |
| Freedom of Expression and Censorship TikTok Rolls Out Plan to Combat Election Misinformation: The platform announced an “election center,” which users can visit to find “authoritative information” on political topics, as well as a new fact-checking process and labels for content posted by governments, politicians, and political parties. Facebook and Instagram Remove Accounts of Prominent Anti-Vaccine Nonprofit: Following a 30-day ban, Children’s Health Defense saw itself removed from both platforms for “repeatedly” violating the sites’ policies on medical misinformation. |
| Practice Note Australia’s High Court Rules for Google in Defamation Case: The Court found that Google was not a “publisher” of, and therefore is not subject to liability for, a link to an allegedly defamatory story posted on the platform in 2014. The Court reasoned that Google “merely facilitated access” to the story and did not encourage users to read it. |
| On the Lighter Side Record Set for Longest Use of Brain-Computer Interface: A 36-year-old paralyzed man has set the record for the longest use of a brain-computer interface after having it installed for 7 years and three months. The interface, which is a pencil-eraser-sized electrode that implants into the brain, allows patients to control computers and prosthetics using their minds. |
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| Ron Lazebnik Academic Director, Fordham CLIP Tom Norton Executive Director, Fordham CLIP |