ICE's interest in high-tech gear raises new questions: 'What is it for?'

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/12/26/ice-high-tech-surveillance-lower-privacy-guardrails-00705401

#HackerNews #ICE #High-Tech #Surveillance #Privacy #Concerns #Technology #Ethics #Accountability

The gift card accountability sink

https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/gift-card-accountability-sink/

#HackerNews #giftcards #accountability #finance #technology #innovation

Good Idea: Political Accountability

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c1w07n8n3e7o

Welsh politicians who are caught lying could face losing their seats under new recommendations from the Senedd's Standards of Conduct Committee, which proposes strengthening the existing standards regime rather than making lying a criminal offence. The suggested changes include empowering the standards commissioner to launch investigations, requiring corrections for false statements, involving lay members in oversight, and potentially allowing voters to recall dishonest members. The aim is to rebuild public trust by toughening rules and sanctions, though the Welsh government is still considering the proposals and how best to define deliberate deception.

#Accountability #Politics #PublicTrust #Wales

ESET will retire its Password Manager on Oct 18, 2027, with all stored data deleted after shutdown. 🔐

Users must export credentials and migrate early as renewals and activations face strict cutoffs. ⏳

🔗 https://proton.me/blog/eset-password-manager

#TechNews #Security #Privacy #Data #Cybersecurity #Encryption #OpenSource #Passwords #Migration #UserRights #Accountability #Tech #DigitalSafety #ESET #Password #PasswordManager

Amazon’s Ring is rolling out “Familiar Faces,” an opt-in facial-recognition tool that catalogs up to 50 known visitors 🚪

Amazon says data is encrypted, but past law-enforcement partnerships and security issues raise concerns about biometric handling 🔒

🔗 https://techcrunch.com/2025/12/09/amazons-ring-rolls-out-controversial-ai-powered-facial-recognition-feature-to-video-doorbells/

#TechNews #Privacy #AI #Surveillance #Security #Data #Biometrics #ConsumerRights #SmartHome #BigTech #Policy #Safety #Ethics #DigitalRights #Accountability #Amazon #Ring #Encryption

Good Idea: Political Accountability

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c1w07n8n3e7o

Welsh politicians who are caught lying could face losing their seats under new recommendations from the Senedd's Standards of Conduct Committee, which proposes strengthening the existing standards regime rather than making lying a criminal offence. The suggested changes include empowering the standards commissioner to launch investigations, requiring corrections for false statements, involving lay members in oversight, and potentially allowing voters to recall dishonest members. The aim is to rebuild public trust by toughening rules and sanctions, though the Welsh government is still considering the proposals and how best to define deliberate deception.

#Accountability #Politics #PublicTrust #Wales

Amazon’s Ring is rolling out “Familiar Faces,” an opt-in facial-recognition tool that catalogs up to 50 known visitors 🚪

Amazon says data is encrypted, but past law-enforcement partnerships and security issues raise concerns about biometric handling 🔒

🔗 https://techcrunch.com/2025/12/09/amazons-ring-rolls-out-controversial-ai-powered-facial-recognition-feature-to-video-doorbells/

#TechNews #Privacy #AI #Surveillance #Security #Data #Biometrics #ConsumerRights #SmartHome #BigTech #Policy #Safety #Ethics #DigitalRights #Accountability #Amazon #Ring #Encryption

I feel like the general populace might not realize the importance of this idea that @pluralistic shares:

what Dan Davies calles an "accountability sink." The radiologist's job isn't really to oversee the AI's work, it's to take the blame for the AI's mistakes.

this human (sometimes only nominally) in the loop is central to law as a whole not being broken

it's also of utmost importance for weapons of war, where AI actually is having life and death impact right now, with non-hypotheticals like "how do we make sure the system doesn't kill innocents without repercussions"

because if there's no repercussions the system will end up externalizing on the way to maximizing other metrics

https://pluralistic.net/2025/12/05/pop-that-bubble/

#AI #accountability

ESET will retire its Password Manager on Oct 18, 2027, with all stored data deleted after shutdown. 🔐

Users must export credentials and migrate early as renewals and activations face strict cutoffs. ⏳

🔗 https://proton.me/blog/eset-password-manager

#TechNews #Security #Privacy #Data #Cybersecurity #Encryption #OpenSource #Passwords #Migration #UserRights #Accountability #Tech #DigitalSafety #ESET #Password #PasswordManager

I feel like the general populace might not realize the importance of this idea that @pluralistic shares:

what Dan Davies calles an "accountability sink." The radiologist's job isn't really to oversee the AI's work, it's to take the blame for the AI's mistakes.

this human (sometimes only nominally) in the loop is central to law as a whole not being broken

it's also of utmost importance for weapons of war, where AI actually is having life and death impact right now, with non-hypotheticals like "how do we make sure the system doesn't kill innocents without repercussions"

because if there's no repercussions the system will end up externalizing on the way to maximizing other metrics

https://pluralistic.net/2025/12/05/pop-that-bubble/

#AI #accountability

Public servants are meant to be transparent. Private citizens are meant to be… private. Flip that, and you don’t have a democracy anymore — you have surveillance.

#Privacy #DigitalRights #AntiSurveillance #CivilLiberties #Accountability #Transparency #FediPrivacy