Greetings, and happy international day of happiness!
There is some facial recognition adjacent content to kick off the newsletter this week. Business Insider has a story on problems with a facial recognition system used to verify Walmart drivers’ identity. Aberdeen is thinking of upgrading its surveillance camera system to run BriefCam, which can apparently search through footage on a keyword basis. Abeba Brihane has an op-ed in the Irish Times on the proposals to introduce facial recognition legislation in …. Ireland. Big Brother Watch also have a press release detailing the use of facial recognition around dating apps. Where, obviously, the privacy and safety implications are staggering. While the headline focuses on the use of FRT to identify cheating spouses, the app also advertises itself in terms of the ability to check if ‘the new girl in the office is single and dating’. Horrible.
WIRED has a really interesting story on the development of AI Agents, like chatbots 2.0, that can actually (apparently) develop solutions to problems.
The Register also has a piece on how quality of life declines with increased exposure to AI, robotics, and wearables in the workplace. It is perhaps, of no great surprise, that being constantly monitored may induce stress. The underlying report, by the Institute for the Future of Work, is here.
This segues (is that really how you write that?) neatly into a piece on how Chinese citizens are coping with pervasive surveillance. TL;DR they’re not.
Thanks as ever to Sarah Zarmsky.
Today’s song is ‘I’d rather go blind‘. It’s not really in the spirit of happiness, I guess. But its so gorgeous.
Be well, and hope you all have a wonderfully happy day.
I guess, if I was going for a more traditional international day of happiness song, it’d be 54-46.
—
European Parliament, Artificial Intelligence Act: MEPs adopt landmark law
The Standard, Deepfake abuse ‘new frontier’ of violence against women, peers warned
AI News, EU approves controversial AI Act to mixed reactions
MIT Technology Review, Let’s not make the same mistakes with AI that we made with social media
MIT Technology Review, An AI that can play Goat Simulator is a step toward more useful machines
MIT Technology Review LLMs become more covertly racist with human intervention
Towards Data Science, AI Weather Models Now Outperform Traditional Forecasts
UNESCO, Generative AI: UNESCO study reveals alarming evidence of regressive gender stereotypes
Technology’s Legal Edge, Fundamental Rights Impact Assessments under the EU AI Act: Who, what and how?
Financial Times, Mercedes trials humanlike robots for ‘demanding and repetitive’ tasks
The Washington Post, Europe asks Google, Facebook, TikTok and other platforms how they’re reducing generative AI risks
The Guardian, Political operative and firms behind Biden AI robocall sued for thousands
WIRED, Forget Chatbots. AI Agents Are the Future
The Register, Advanced tech is harming worker wellness, study finds
The Washington Post, New AI tools can record your medical appointment or draft a message from your doctor
Financial Times, AI explores ‘dark genome’ to shed light on cancer growth
Financial Times, What the cold war space race can teach us on AI
The Washington Post, US spearheads first UN resolution on artificial intelligence — aimed at ensuring equal access
The Guardian, ‘Staying silent? Not an option’: family takes fight against deepfake nudes to Washington
The Register, AI models exhibit racism based on written dialect
WIRED, An AI-Altered Hitler Speech Is Going Viral On X
Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, EU: Artificial Intelligence rulebook fails to stop proliferation of abusive technologies, says Amnesty
Big Brother Watch, UnHerd – New app uses AI to hunt down cheating spouses
Algorithm Watch, EU Parliament votes on AI Act; member states will have to plug surveillance loopholes
MIT Technology Review, Africa’s push to regulate AI starts now
The Washington Post, Group sues after novel Biden deepfake urged voters to skip N.H. primary
WIRED, Reddit’s Sale of User Data for AI Training Draws FTC Inquiry
The Washington Post, Migrants lacking passports must now submit to facial recognition to board flights in US
Business Insider, Facial recognition tech is widespread now, but still might not recognize you
BBC News, CCTV upgrade could speed up Aberdeen crime suspect tracing
Blog Posts
ICRC Humanitarian Law & Policy, Falling under the radar: the problem of algorithmic bias and military applications of AI
The Conversation, Ghostbots: AI versions of deceased loved ones could be a serious threat to mental health
The Conversation, AI is creating fake legal cases and making its way into real courtrooms, with disastrous results
The Conversation, Digital surveillance is omnipresent in China. Here’s how citizens are coping
RAILS, Ethics At The Crossroads Of AI And Law: Challenges In Automated Justice
Reports
Privacy International, PI submission on human rights implications of new and emerging technologies in the military domain
Academic Literature
*Disclaimer: The following articles, chapters, and books have not been evaluated for their methodology and do not necessarily reflect the views of the AI & Human Right Blog
N. Wiedemann et al., Where you go is who you are: a study on machine learning based semantic privacy attacks
E. Agyemang et al, Toward achieving smart cities in Africa: challenges to data use and the way forward
First Issue of the Journal of AI Law and Regulation
Media
The Guardian (Podcast), Can US Congress control the abuse of AI in the 2024 election? – podcast