Communications Law 2023

Questions of the Week (Class 12)

On the occasion of our final class of the semester (I will be in the U.K. speaking at a conference put on by the Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary University of London (https://www.morethanjustagame.london/mtjg-london-iv-programme), it seems only fair to re-ask a series of questions that we examined throughout the course. This gives everyone a fresh and final attempt at considering what you feel the operating governance principles of our communications system ought to be. Note that some of the questions are overstated in an attempt to make them yield a truer result (who’s going to say “no” to a soft question like “Should data privacy be encouraged?”) There are obviously a lot more questions that could/should be asked, but we can leave those to your term papers.

Please wait until (just?) after class to answer the following seven questions:

Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment. Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment. Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment. Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment. Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment. Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment. Sorry, there are no polls available at the moment.

Thanks for playing 😉

Jon

Internet and Elections News Continue – with a Newspaper Appearance!

Hi everyone,

INTERNET AND ELECTION NEWS CONTINUE

Although, we all addressed Canada’s lack of involvement in invasive data use especially in light of what happened with Cambridge Analytics and their use of Facebook data in order to help the Republicans win the US presidential election, it turns out some Canadians are not totally incapable of using the Internet for political purposes.

This past week it has come to light through the same Cambridge Analytics whistle blower that a Canadian company, AggregateIQ – that was widely credited for its outsized role in convincing British voters to leave the European Union was also used in an effort to sidestep Brexit campaign spending limits — though whether the firm was in on the alleged scheme itself is not clear.

Accordingly, whether foul play is found or not by the company it is still interesting to again see the Internet being used for such major political platforms. In addition, it has been alleged that AggregateIQ did work on projects for Cambridge Analytica and now the work done by the company in connection to Brexit is being investigated by the BC Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner and Britains Information Comissioner.

Article: http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/aggregateiq-aiq-brexit-vote-leave-beleave-whistleblower-1.4592056

NEWSPAPER CONNECTION

In connection to the newspaper presentation we had last week I also wanted to add how Facebook is now posting apologies in newspapers regarding the data scandal in the form of advertisements! The apologies appeared in: he New York Times and The Washington Post in the U.S. and The Sunday Times and The Sunday Telegraph in the United Kingdom.

Article: http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/facebook-apology-ads-data-mining-1.4592404

MEDIA, COMMUNICATIONS & NET NEUTRALITY

DIGITAL

CREATIVITY

SURVEILLANCE & PRIVACY

GAMES

Jon

“Crisis in Confidence”

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/christopher-wylie-facebook-liberals-canada-cambridge-analytica-1.4586046

The story of the massive privacy breach from facebook continues to grow and implicate more Canadian politicians. This recent story has forced the current Liberal party to disclose that they contracted with the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie in 2016 at a cost of $100,000.

The article does not go into detail about what Wylie’s company (“Eunoia”) did exactly for the Liberals, although they do describe creating “social-media monitoring tools” and sample Canadian voter profiles. The contract with Wylie’s company was ultimately not renewed, but exactly how many Canadians had their data used, the legal terms governing that data, and the extent of the $100,000 work remains obscure.

In question period following the revelations, the Liberal party, in their defense to the use of their “data driven activities” point out that the Conservative Party had a similar $100,000 contract with the public relations data firm Agility PR Solutions.

In response to all this, the Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien “launched an investigation to determine whether any personal information of Canadians was affected by the alleged unauthorized access to Facebook user profiles.” Another news report quotes the Commissioner as asking for more meaningful, binding powers in light of recent alleged data abuses:

This week’s events have shown that weak privacy safeguards can have serious effects that go beyond the commercial realm, potentially distorting democracy, Therrien said. “It’s a wake up call, frankly, if not a crisis in confidence.”

Therrien wants other legislative changes to usher privacy laws into the era of big data and artificial intelligence, including new powers for his office to audit companies, make binding orders and levy fines.

Some questions arise in light of these comments, such as, what form should those legislative changes take to be truly effective? And, how can users meaningfully enforce their rights in cyberspace?

Net Neutrality

Hey everyone,

Next week I’ll be giving a presentation on the topic of Net Neutrality.

As a general introduction, I’ll be discussing the following and more:

– What is Net Neutrality?
– The current position of Canada
– The recent changes in the US
– Arguments for and against
– Possibilities for the future

I’ll leave you with this nifty one minute video on the subject, and I look forward to seeing you all.

Crypto Currency Crime

I recently found two articles highlighting how virtual cash or crypto currency can be a tool to gain illegal economic advantages.

The first example is with cyber thieves using virtual cash for money laundering. In fact Dr McGuire drawing from an early 2018 study stated that “between $80bn (£57bn) and $200bn of cash generated by cyber-crime is laundered every year .” In addition, the growth of property sites that accept virtual cash payments for apartments and even private islands could help criminals launder large amounts of money. In addition, illegal revenues that previously would flow through established financial institutions can now confuse authorities as they flow through external, cyber jurisdictions. Currently, authorities around the world are finding different ways to shut down these forms of cyber crimes, especially since the use of bitcoin by criminals has been drawing serious attention to police.

The second example is with Trump’s recent executive order to ban purchases of Venezuela’s new crypto currency because America has a sanction against them. The US Treasury also warned domestic investors in February not to touch petro in case it violated sanctions, saying “the petro digital currency would appear to be an extension of credit to the Venezuelan government” and “could therefore expose US persons to legal risk.”

Both these examples display the ability for crypto currency to circumvent legal means of financial trade if there is no regulation and laws like Trump’s order – proof of this is with the rising price of Bitcoin being attributed to increasing crypto currency crime.

However, individuals have stated that in the end criminals need to change their virtual cash to real money and that will be the ultimate regulation against crypto currency crime.

Articles:

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-43428264

https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/19/17139892/trump-bans-venezuela-nicolas-maduro-national-cryptocurrency-bitcoin-petro

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2018/01/26/bitcoin-fraud-triples-criminals-target-cryptocurrency-boom/