Facebook Feature Made For Employers

This past Wednesday, Mark Zuckerberg hosted a gaggle of reporters at Facebook headquarters to announce a range of new features for the popular social networking site. Among the new features is a tool called Download My Information which allows a user to request all of the personal data, pictures, videos, wall posts, friends list and any other data related to the user that is stored on Facebook's servers. Basically, Facebook gives you access to your entire footprint on the site in a single zip file.

Download My Information is part of broader effort by Facebook to allow users more control over their personal information and privacy settings. While these efforts by Facebook may be commendable, the biggest winner in all of this might not be the Facebook users themselves but potential employers. Employers have long been interested in the online activities of prospective employees. By now anyone worth hiring has figured out to take advantage of built in privacy settings to restrict their profiles to friends. To combat this increased use of privacy settings, some employers have gone so far as to require that applicants provide usernames and passwords to any social networking sites the use as part of their application. Thanks to Facebook's Download My Information feature, employers will simply be able to require job applicants to include this complete record of their Facebook activities as part of the application process.

In a world where Download My Information profiles will soon be application requirements as ubiquitous as resumes, writing samples, and references, you have to ask whether employers ability to request such information should be legally restricted. Look at the information contained in a Facebook profile: religion, political views, sexual preference, people you associate with, etc. This is very personal information, and it would be illegal for an employer to ask you about much of this information in an interview. Congress has limited the ability to request other sensitive information. The Americans With Disabilities Act, along with other state and federal laws, restricts an employer's ability to request job applicants provide medical records. Congress and state legislatures should pass similar protections for digital information.

Some people will argue that individuals voluntarily put their information on Facebook with the intention of sharing it with others and have thus exposed it to the world. Even accepting this argument, there's a reason users start an uproar every time Facebook changes its privacy settings. People post information to Facebook accounts with the intention of sharing it only with the people they choose. Some users will make their profiles open to the world, others will set their accounts to the highest privacy settings available. People taking advantage of privacy settings restricting the flow of information shouldn't waive the right restrict access to their account information just because they disclosed it to a select group of friends.

Government Overcoming Fear of Geoengineering Taboo

The setup should sound familiar by now: humans all over the planet emitting huge plumes of particles into the atmosphere, the net effect of which causes our planet's climate to slowly change over time. Most people imagine a smokestack spewing CO2 and contributing to the problem of global warming, but for a growing number of climate scientists and policymakers the above scenario is starting to sound like part of the solution. The Washington Post recently published an article on the growing acceptance of geoengineering as a legitimate part of the climate change debate.

Geoengineering is the polar opposite of global warming. Instead of the byproduct of human production causing unintentional change to Earth's climate, geoengineering is the deliberate manipulation of the atmosphere with the express intention of altering Earth's climate. Hopefully, the end result of geoengineering efforts is to counteract our unintentional manipulation of Earth's atmosphere that is the root cause of global warming. Geoengineering efforts generally fit into two categories. The first method of geoengineering is to strip CO2 and other greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere using artificial means. Examples include using artificial trees and seeding the ocean with iron to promote abnormally large algae growths to sequester carbon dioxide. The second category of geoengineering methods are projects aimed at increasing Earth's albedo, or increasing how strongly Earth reflects light from the sun. Earth's albedo can be increased by dispersing reflective particles high into the atmosphere or cloud-seeding by spraying saltwater into the air.

A few things struck me as I read the WaPo article. Primarily, I was shocked how little geoengineering had been discussed and considered by the government. While some progress is being made, the government is just now considering how to study the feasibility of geoengineering. They're issuing reports on how to begin the process of creating reports on whether or not to implement a policy. That's so far removed from actually finding a solution to the problem it can't rightly be called governing at all. From the article you get the impression the the primary stumbling block for actually considering geoengineering has been the fear of lawmakers that it was taboo to suggest "playing god."

The article even suggested that geoengineering research could be quickly and efficiently integrated into existing government research projects, but that administration officials are afraid to do so without political cover because it is so controversial. Scientific research should not governed by the politics of fear and ignorance. Congress and the Executive Branch can't just bury their heads in the sand and hope this whole global warming thing blows over. The government needs to give legitimate consideration into every conceivably viable option. Even if the government doesn't come up with a coherent policy on geoengineering, the private sector will force the issue. Earlier this year, Bill Gates announced he'd allocate $5 million to fund geoengineering research. Projects funded by Mr. Gates include development of cloud-seeding machines by a San Francisco-based research group called Silver Lining. Billionaire philanthropists may be enough to get the ball rolling, but global warming is the type of problem governments exist to solve - a project needing a massive coordination of effort to bring about a solution that's in all of our best interest but beyond any of our individual capacities.

One opponent of geoengineering research, Patrick J. Michaels of the Cato Institute, raises a novel legal question. Namely, could any geoengineering research project satisfy a federal environmental impact statement? Without Congressional intervention, laws aimed at protecting the environment at the local level could hamper future government agency efforts to save the environment on a global scale.

Oversight iPhone App

Government transparency is tightly intertwined with technological advancement. If you need proof, look at today's announcement from Republican congressman Darrell Issa, ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Rep. Issa introduced a new iPhone app, called GovWatch, aimed at leveraging "cutting-edge mobile communications technology to boost transparency, accountability, and information sharing in government." The app gives users access to press releases, tweets, Facebook posts and videos from the minority members on the Committee.

I'm surprised that GovWatch is the first congressional committee iPhone app. Outside of major legislative initiatives, committee activities are rarely covered by major news outlets - making it incredibly difficult for the public to keep up-to-date on committee actions. Congressional leaders have a responsibility to help the voting public stay informed about what their government is doing. Apps provide a direct link between representatives and the public, keeping voters informed at a low cost. More congressional committees should embrace smartphone apps as a way to reach out to voters.

Government transparency should be an issue with bipartisan support. Small government republicans should naturally embrace transparency - you need a full inventory of what the government is doing before you can effectively reign in spending. Putting knowledge of the government's true scope in the hands of voters will allow them to make informed decisions and rally support for small government politicians. Democrats in favor of more expansive government are not in favor of indiscriminately big government, but an efficient government providing necessary services. Increased transparency helps eliminate government waste and ensures government funds are reaching the people most in need.

Arizona Senate Passes Human-Animal Hybrid Bill

Arizona's state legislature, having solved all of the state's other problems with its recent anti-immigration bill, decided to tackle the apparently urgent problem of human-animal hybrids. The bill passed by the AZ Senate provides, in pertinent part:

A. A person shall not intentionally or knowingly create or attempt to create an in vitro human embryo by any means other than fertilization of a human egg by a human sperm.
B. A person shall not intentionally or knowingly:
1. Create or attempt to create a human-animal hybrid.
2. Transfer or attempt to transfer a human embryo into a nonhuman womb.
3. Transfer or attempt to transfer a nonhuman embryo into a human womb.
4. Transport or receive for any purpose a human-animal hybrid.

The Arizona bill is remarkably similar to the Human-Animal Hybrid Prohibition Act of 2009, introduced in the U.S. Senate by Senator Brownback. The Arizona version includes language exempting research involving transgenetic animal models containing human genes and xenotransplantation of human organs, neither of which was found in Senator Brownback's bill. While this is a laudable improvement protecting some research, the bill is still aimed at curtailing scientific progress. The broad language, part (B)(1) in particular, could cover a wide variety of potentially lifesaving research.

Laws limiting scientific freedom should be avoided at all costs. Arizona is free not to fund such research, but the state shouldn't outlaw it altogether. If such laws absolutely must be passed, it should handled at the national level, not by a patchwork of state laws.


Hat tip to Politico: Arizona legislature targets 'human-animal hybrids'

Should Social Network Privacy Settings Be Regulated?

Recent changes to Facebook's user privacy policy are drawing the ire of more than just hastily arranged protest groups promising action if they can only reach 1 million members. After Facebook announced its new policy, which will allow the social networking site to share user information and curtail users' ability to keep information private, Senators Schumer, Bennet, Franken and Begich sent a letter to Mark Zuckerberg expressing their concern over the privacy changes. The letter outlined three areas of concern:

1. Facebook's new policy makes publicly available a user's current city, hometown, education, work, likes, interests and friends. Users must either allow this information to remain available or delete it entirely. The letter argues that users should have more control over what information is public.
2. Third-parties can store users information indefinitely, up from 24 hours under Facebook's previous policy. The letter recommends either reverting to the 24 hour policy or making users opt-in before allowing their information to be stored indefinitely.
3. Partners for Facebook's new "instant personalization" feature have access to user's friends list. While users are currently allowed to opt-out, the letter argues that it should be a clear and coherent opt-in provision.

Senator Schumer also sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission urging them to set guidelines on the use of information submitted by users of social networking sites like Facebook, Myspace and Twitter. The Senator is prepared to offer legislation authorizing the FTC to examine practices in the disclosure of private information from social networking sites and to ensure users have the ability to prohibit the sharing of personal information.

Asking the FTC to regulate broadly across all social networks might not be the best solution. Will professional networking services like LinkedIn be included under the FTC regulations? It's pretty safe to assume the interests and privacy concerns of LinkedIn users differ from those of Myspace users. That said, the FTC may be able to find some common ground for minimum privacy standards, leaving individual services free to give their users a higher level of control.

The truly egregious act by Facebook wasn't setting the privacy controls at the current level, it was pulling a privacy bait-and-switch on its users. Facebook got 400 million people to sign up to use a service, including entering personal information, based on privacy rules that allowed them to strictly limit who could see that information. Once an enormous amount of valuable information had been put online, Facebook gradually started rolling back the amount of control users had over their own information.

If the government is going to play any role in regulating social networking sites, it should focus on ensuring smooth and transparent transitions when privacy policies change. Protect users from being defrauded into posting personal information under the illusion of privacy only to have all the information made public by future changes. If a user enters information under one privacy policy, that policy should continually apply to that information unless affirmatively waived. Facebook's new policy should only apply to information entered after the changes were made.

Rachel Maddow Takes A Cheap Shot @ SCOTUS

Court watchers, political pundits and privacy advocates alike had an eye on the Supreme Court this week as the justices heard oral arguments in City of Ontario v. Quon. The question before the Court was whether a police officer had a reasonable expectation of privacy for text messages sent and received on a government issued pager. The officer filed suit after the City audited his text messages. While the city did not have an explicit policy in regard to the usage of and access by the city to messages sent from pagers, it did have a general "Computer Usage, Internet and E-mail Policy" reserving to the city the right to access emails stored on city servers.

The argument raised significant questions as to whether or not the city's email policy put the officer on notice that his pager messages were also subject to review. A key factor in answering this issue is the exact nature of email vs. pager messages, triggering some technical questions from the justices. Here's how Rachel Maddow covered these questions:

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Pretty harsh treatment of Justice Roberts and others, painting them as out of touch and not at all tech savvy. The oral argument transcript, however, reveals a different story:

JUSTICE GINSBURG: But my question is, an employee reads this policy and says, oh, my e-mails are going to be subject to being monitored --

MR. DAMMEIER: Sure.

JUSTICE GINSBURG: Wouldn't that employee expect that the policy would carry over to pagers? When you think of what's the reason why they want to look at the e-mails, wouldn't the same reason apply?

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Maybe -- maybe everybody else knows this, but what is the difference between the pager and the e-mail?

MR. DAMMEIER: Sure. The e-mail, looking at the computer policy, that goes through the city's computer, it goes through the city's server, it goes through all the equipment that -- that has -- that the city can easily monitor. Here the pagers are a separate device that goes home with you, that travels with you, that you can use on duty, off-duty.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: You can do that with emails.

MR. DAMMEIER: Certainly, certainly. But . . . in this instance it went through no city equipment, it went through Arch Wireless and then was transmitted to [another person].

Instead of ignorant questions from a technology illiterate CJ, the exchange above cuts to the very core of the case. The Ontario email policy was based in part on the use of city-owned computers and network resources, allowing the department to audit emails stored on city-owned servers. Justice Roberts' question was searching out a legally significant difference between the expectations of privacy with the email situation described above and that of messages sent on a pager - which used no resources, other than the actual pager device itself, besides the Arch Wireless network.

I understand that it is easy - with a little editing - to score some points by painting the Court as out of touch. Attacks like this give credence to the opponents to allowing TV cameras into Supreme Court oral arguments. A ten-second sound bite can't always convey the nuanced back and forth of a legal argumentation at the highest level. Cameras could open up the doors for millions of Americans to experience one of the most important institutions in our country. Unfortunately, it would also open the Supreme Court to attack from those who would forget the whole of the argument and merely twist snippets to fit their agenda.

Allow Me To Introduce Myself

Welcome to Innovation Congress!

As I launch this project, it might be helpful to tell you a little bit about myself and my vision for Innovation Congress. My undergraduate degree is in the hard sciences, but my chosen profession is the law. I see this site as a forum for discussing the intersection between my two passions. The primary focus will be developments in science & technology policy and law. This encompasses a broad range of issues, including science education, alternative energy funding in climate change legislation, space policy and funding, government transparency, online privacy and intellectual property.

I chose the name Innovation Congress not just because I intend to follow legislative developments in the science and technology realm, but out of a desire to embracing a broader meaning of congress - a forum for people to come together and discuss important issues. I hope my posts spur vigorous debate in the comments. In that spirit, I welcome guest contributors who wish to express opposing viewpoints or address issues I've yet to recognize.

Once again, welcome to Innovation Congress. I hope you enjoy.