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News

Minneapolis police used traffic stops and fake social media profiles to target communities of color | MIT Technology Review

by Tate Ryan-Mosley and S Richards

“Since 2010, of the 14 individuals that MPD officers have killed, 13 of those individuals were people of color or Indigenous individuals,” the report states. “People of color and Indigenous individuals comprise approximately 42% of the Minneapolis population but comprise 93% of all MPD officer-involved deaths between January 1, 2010, to February 2, 2022.” A clear racial disparity can be seen in the widespread use of chemical and other “less-lethal” weapons as well. MPD officers deploy pepper spray against Black people at a higher rate than they do against white people. From the report: “Officers recorded using chemical irritants in 25.1% of use of force incidents involving Black individuals. In contrast, MPD officers recorded using chemical irritants in 18.2% of use of force incidents involving white individuals in similar circumstances.” Overall, according to the report, “between January 1, 2010, to December 31, 2020, 63% of all use of force incidents that MPD officers recorded were against Black individuals.” Traffic stops were unfortunately no different. “Although Black individuals comprise approximately 19% of the Minneapolis population, MPD’s data shows that from January 1, 2017, to May 24, 2020, 78%—or over 6,500—of all searches conducted by MPD officers were searches of Black individuals or their vehicles during officer-initiated traffic stops.” Black people in Minneapolis are at six times greater risk of being treated with force during traffic stops than their white neighbors, according to the report. The Minneapolis Police Department has not replied to our request for comment. [...] Source: Minneapolis police used traffic stops and fake social media profiles to target communities of color | MIT Technology Review

May 3, 2022

News

‘Bossware is coming for almost every worker’: the software you might not realize is watching you | The Guardian

by Zoë Corn

When the job of a young east coast-based analyst – we’ll call him James – went remote with the pandemic, he didn’t envisage any problems. The company, a large US retailer for which he has been a salaried employee for more than half a decade, provided him with a laptop, and his home became his new office. Part of a team dealing with supply chain issues, the job was a busy one, but never had he been reprimanded for not working hard enough. So it was a shock when his team was hauled in one day late last year to an online meeting to be told there was gaps in its work: specifically periods when people – including James himself, he was later informed – weren’t inputting information into the company’s database. As far as team members knew, no one had been watching them on the job. But as it became clear what had happened, James grew furious. Can a company really use computer monitoring tools – known as “bossware” to critics – to tell if you’re productive at work? Or if you’re about to run away to a competitor with proprietary knowledge? Or even, simply, if you’re happy? [...] Source: ‘Bossware is coming for almost every worker’: the software you might not realize is watching you | The Guardian

May 2, 2022

News

New Amazon Worker Chat App Would Ban Words Like “Union” | The Intercept

by Ken Klippenstein

Amazon will block and flag employee posts on a planned internal messaging app that contain keywords pertaining to labor unions, according to internal company documents reviewed by The Intercept. An automatic word monitor would also block a variety of terms that could represent potential critiques of Amazon’s working conditions, like “slave labor,” “prison,” and “plantation,” as well as “restrooms” — presumably related to reports of Amazon employees relieving themselves in bottles to meet punishing quotas. “Our teams are always thinking about new ways to help employees engage with each other,” said Amazon spokesperson Barbara M. Agrait. “This particular program has not been approved yet and may change significantly or even never launch at all.” In November 2021, Amazon convened a high-level meeting in which top executives discussed plans to create an internal social media program that would let employees recognize co-workers’ performance with posts called “Shout-Outs,” according to a source with direct knowledge. The major goal of the program, Amazon’s head of worldwide consumer business, Dave Clark, said, was to reduce employee attrition by fostering happiness among workers — and also productivity. Shout-Outs would be part of a gamified rewards system in which employees are awarded virtual stars and badges for activities that “add direct business value,” documents state. At the meeting, Clark remarked that “some people are insane star collectors.” But company officials also warned of what they called “the dark side of social media” and decided to actively monitor posts in order to ensure a “positive community.” At the meeting, Clark suggested that the program should resemble an online dating app like Bumble, which allows individuals to engage one on one, rather than a more forum-like platform like Facebook. Source: New Amazon Worker Chat App Would Ban Words Like “Union” | The Intercept

April 4, 2022

News

The giant plan to track diversity in research journals | Nature

by Holly Else and Jeffrey M. Perkel

In the next year, researchers should expect to face a sensitive set of questions whenever they send their papers to journals, and when they review or edit manuscripts. More than 50 publishers representing over 15,000 journals globally are preparing to ask scientists about their race or ethnicity — as well as their gender — in an initiative that’s part of a growing effort to analyse researcher diversity around the world. Publishers say that this information, gathered and stored securely, will help to analyse who is represented in journals, and to identify whether there are biases in editing or review that sway which findings get published. Pilot testing suggests that many scientists support the idea, although not all. The effort comes amid a push for a wider acknowledgement of racism and structural racism in science and publishing — and the need to gather more information about it. In any one country, such as the United States, ample data show that minority groups are under-represented in science, particularly at senior levels. But data on how such imbalances are reflected — or intensified — in research journals are scarce. Publishers haven’t systematically looked, in part because journals are international and there has been no measurement framework for race and ethnicity that made sense to researchers of many cultures. Source: The giant plan to track diversity in research journals | Nature

March 1, 2022

News

Facial recognition firm Clearview AI tells investors it’s seeking massive expansion beyond law enforcement | The Washington Post

by Drew Harwell

The facial recognition company Clearview AI is telling investors it is on track to have 100 billion facial photos in its database within a year, enough to ensure “almost everyone in the world will be identifiable,” according to a financial presentation from December obtained by The Washington Post. Those images — equivalent to 14 photos for each of the 7 billion people on Earth — would help power a surveillance system that has been used for arrests and criminal investigations by thousands of law enforcement and government agencies around the world. And the company wants to expand beyond scanning faces for the police, saying in the presentation that it could monitor “gig economy” workers and is researching a number of new technologies that could identify someone based on how they walk, detect their location from a photo or scan their fingerprints from afar. Source: Facial recognition firm Clearview AI tells investors it’s seeking massive expansion beyond law enforcement | The Washington Post

March 1, 2022

News

Abolition newspaper revived for nation grappling with racism | AP News

by Philip Marcelo

BOSTON (AP) — America’s first newspaper dedicated to ending slavery is being resurrected and reimagined more than two centuries later as the nation continues to grapple with its legacy of racism. The revived version of The Emancipator is a joint effort by Boston University’s Center for Antiracist Research and The Boston Globe’s Opinion team that’s expected to launch in the coming months. Deborah Douglas and Amber Payne, co-editors-in-chief of the new online publication, say it will feature written and video opinion pieces, multimedia series, virtual talks and other content by respected scholars and seasoned journalists. The goal, they say, is to “reframe” the national conversation around racial injustice. “I like to say it’s anti-racism, every day, on purpose,” said Douglas, who joined the project after working as a journalism professor at DePauw University in Indiana. “We are targeting anyone who wants to be a part of the solution to creating an anti-racist society because we think that leads us to our true north, which is democracy.” Source: Abolition newspaper revived for nation grappling with racism | AP News

February 28, 2022

News

The trouble with Roblox, the video game empire built on child labour | The Guardian

by Simon Parkin

Anna* was 10 when she built her first video game on Roblox, a digital platform where young people can make, share and play games together. She used Roblox much like a child from a previous generation might have used cardboard boxes, marker pens and stuffed toys to build a castle or a spaceship and fill it with characters and story. There was one alluring difference: Roblox hosted Anna’s tiny world online, enabling children she had never met and who maybe lived thousands of miles away from her home in Utah to visit and play. Using Roblox’s in-built tools – child-friendly versions of professional software – Anna began to learn the rudiments of music composition, computer programming and 3D modelling. Game-making became an obsession. When she wasn’t at school Anna was rarely off her computer. As she became more proficient, Anna’s work caught the attention of some experienced users on Roblox, game-makers in their 20s who messaged her with a proposition to collaborate on a more ambitious project. Flattered by their interest, Anna became the fifth member of the nascent team, contributing art, design and programming to the game. She did not sign up to make money, but during a Skype call the game-makers offered the teenager 10% of any profits the game made in the future. It turned out to be a generous offer. Within a few months, the game had become one of the most played on Roblox. For Anna, success had an unfathomable, life-changing impact. At 16 her monthly income somehow exceeded her parents’ combined salaries. She calculated that she was on course to earn $300,000 in a year, a salary equivalent to that of a highly experienced Google programmer. Anna cancelled her plans to go to college. Source: The trouble with Roblox, the video game empire built…

January 26, 2022

Analysis

Chicago’s “Race-Neutral” Traffic Cameras Ticket Black and Latino Drivers the Most | ProPublica

by Laila Milevski

When then-Mayor Richard M. Daley ushered in Chicago’s red-light cameras nearly two decades ago, he said they would help the city curb dangerous driving. “This is all about safety, safety of pedestrians, safety of other drivers, passengers, everyone,” he said. His successors echoed those sentiments as they expanded camera enforcement. “My goal is only one thing, the safety of our kids,” Rahm Emanuel said in 2011, as he lobbied for the introduction of speed cameras. And in 2020, Lori Lightfoot assured residents her expansion of the program was “about making sure that we keep communities safe.” But for all of their safety benefits, the hundreds of cameras that dot the city — and generate tens of millions of dollars a year for City Hall — have come at a steep cost for motorists from the city’s Black and Latino neighborhoods. A ProPublica analysis of millions of citations found that households in majority Black and Hispanic ZIP codes received tickets at around twice the rate of those in white areas between 2015 and 2019. Source: Chicago’s “Race-Neutral” Traffic Cameras Ticket Black and Latino Drivers the Most | ProPublica

January 17, 2022