AI: Splitting the Seams of Privacy

AI is the future. Beginning as a concept of science fiction as a way to create a better society often resulting in the AI going crazy and killing people. In reality AI is a tool just like a computer or a hammer. It is up to the individual using it to accomplish tasks and objectives. As stated in the video AI over the last few years has developed into a “driving force of Inequality”. In the video In the Age of AI The wealthy can utilize AI to prefer capital over labor with AI being able to accomplish many tasks making thousands of jobs obsolete. 

If the world continues to follow this path of automation the gap between the rich and the poor will only continue to grow leaving less and less room for growth among lower class individuals. AI un-evens the playing field between bigger and smaller companies, with large companies like Meta being capable of targeting what a client is interested in supplying it. The major thing about this that frightens me is the organizations shaping what you see does not have your best interest at mind but rather the idea of making money. 

The lack of privacy stands out as one of the largest detriments of artificial intelligence, through data mining and companies learning about you. In turn, according to Shoshana Zuboff “whenever we search or whenever we browse we leave behind digital traces of our information.” Google with this technology they could fine tune to predict what people want. By taking uncertainty out of the equation we give up a lot of our indepence to technology on the premise it was good for us even if that isn’t the intention of the company. 

The social contagion experiment where Facebook through online messaging attempted to discover if they could influence real world decisions. Goal was to get people to the polls in the 2010 election through the ”I voted” icon collectively getting 300,000 people to vote. They learned they could influence emotion and change real world behavior without them knowing. Products like Google Home or Alexa put AI inside the home to learn more about you and grow overtime. Personally, this is very frightening to me. This brings us back to what we see of AI in those science fiction movies like “2001 A Space Odyssey”. This leads to anyone with enough money can get this data and use it to sway opinion to wherever they want it to go. For example with enough effort a politician can utilize this data to win a presidential election by using the data of people to give them what they want. 

ECTO 2 - Misinformation

Hi I’m Owen, It is important people understand the vocabulary methods of determining if information is either misinformation, malinformation, disinformation. Starting with misinformation, This is false content, however the person sharing doesn’t realize that it is false. This is frequently a piece of disinformation viewed by someone who doesn’t realize it’s false and shares it with their networks without the intent to do harm. Next disinformation, this is content that is intentionally false and designed to cause harm. It is motivated to make money, gain political influence either foreign or domestic. Or to cause chaos. 

Malinformation is information that is true but reported out of context. Some methods of this false information can be seen through many different forms from the least harmful satires, disinformation made for the purpose of comedy to more dangerous forms Fabricated context for example like stating third world countries possess weapons of mass destruction with the purpose of drumming up fear to result in mass panic and war, we have seen this used by the American government throughout history.

In recent days Misinformation has grown from a concept to a full blown fear of Americans. Terms like Fake News directly contradict the 1st amendment. People are given the right of freedom and press, to say anything on the matters they care about. With few exceptions like threats and libel, a person according to the constitution can say more or less anything they want whenever they want. There are a lot of people with strong opinions and a lack of facts. The information they spread could be wrong whether out of ignorance or on purpose.

 However it is not the governments place to control this information and censor what they deem false. It is rather up to the people to learn the difference between information and disinformation to form their own conclusions. The government presents laws to curb the spread of misinformation and lies on social media the issue is this would likely cause more harm than good and result in information true or false that contradicts the government being removed and in doing so this would go against the first amendment clauses of Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Press.

Some functions to uncover and disproving this false information can be useful to individuals to prevent the further spread of misinformation. These strategies include looking for signs of false information. Clickbait for starters is used to draw in views that can be shocking or flashy images to draw attention. While reading this information often emotionally triggering phrases or views can be presented to draw out emotions. When emotions are heightened often people overlook facts and reality. 

Extraordinary claims are often used to shock the audience it’s safe to say in many situations these claims are false. That being said, the most important thing a person can do to avoid disinformation is to fact check. Find multiple sources on the subject to grow your knowledge on the field prior to making your opinions and claims in the area. 

Thank you for listening Does anyone have any questions 

 

Privacy

As like most Americans I value my individual privacy and independence. However I also understand that privacy is more of a myth than a reality in today's age. With technology like facial recognition and social media the people of today live their lives through technology without even realizing their entire life is online. The concept of electronic tattoos was mentioned in the TED talk by Juan Enriquez. Electronic tattoos brand the individual and make them immortal connected to the web. From a young age my dad would warn me about the dangers of living your life online. All it takes is one mistake to mess up someone’s life. 

On a larger scale the government is one of the largest forces against the idea of privacy. Since the 2001 patriot act, the United States government and the people of America agreed to give up freedom in exchange for safety. This extends from license cameras and cell towers as depicted in the TED talk by Catherine Crump. With the more technology introduced to keep tabs on us the country grows closer to that of George Orwells 1984 and the movie Minority Report.

Government officials are getting upset that Tech companies are working out of their way to protect clients from the government intercepting their information. This concept of tapping phones and computers brings up an interesting debate on when protection goes too far. Is it worth living lacking freedom in exchange for the chance to find a terrorist. Personally I value my privacy and I agree with Christopher Soghoan that I don’t want to live in a world controlled by the government on the pretense of stopping crime.  

Technology is great and it contributes a lot to the world however it takes away a lot of the rights we are entitled to without us knowing. It is impossible to fully stay private in today's age but through smart choices and use of encryption software we can stay a little more protected.

ECTO 1 Reaction:The World Wide Web

The World Wide Web first logged onto the scene in 1992 by Inventor Tim Berners-Lee in association with CERN. The internet however was born nearly ten years prior in 1983 however before the invention of the “Web” Accessing information online required coding skills, skills in programming and an overall intuition in the field of computers. This would make using the internet unreachable for many individuals. There are many people who hardly understand how to use the internet now. Imagine how bad it was before Berners-Lee's invention. With the inclusion of the Web Berners-Lee solved this problem by creating a user-friendly system that could be used by anyone. He developed three essential tools to make this possible: HTML, a language for creating pages; HTTP, a protocol for sharing information; and the first web browser. With language sharing and a basic web browser a programmer could build upon this foundation to share their website with the world in a fashion allowing anyone to view it. 

The World Wide Web changed the world of computers, solving many of the problems in communication individuals were struggling with. The Web paved the way for instant communication from computer to computer allowing for not only instant communications between individuals but between companies and consumers as well. For one of the first times in history you could be in a chat room with people living on the other side of the world from the comfort of your living room. This would also set up the rise of e-commerce, businesses like Amazon and eBay changed the way we shop.

The challenges that followed the WWW to some out weigh a lot of the benefits. At launch open access servers came in major issues like privacy, the spread of Disinformation and Malinformation. Scams would become more frequent and many did not understand systems well enough to not get taken advantage of. In addition online businesses like Amazon would go on to monopolize a lot of the shopping industry putting tons of smaller businesses out of work. In the end, the WWW transformed our lives for the better or for the worse is up to you. Berner-Lee did not make something good or bad, however he did give us tools to create on our own. I had missed the presentation day therefore my notes are comprised of the topics side and overall information. 

The First Camera Phone

Hey everyone today I’m going to talk about how a simple invention changed the world of communication forever. The first camera phone has an interesting start as an invention. Through my research I have discovered 3 separate phones that claim to be the original camera phone. These include from South Korea, Samsung SCH-V200, and from Japan, Kyocera Visualphone VP 210. These are considered the first commercial camera phones being invented in 2000, 1999 respectively. But someone beat them too, not Apple, Sony, Microsoft or Nokia but a dad to be who might have watched a few spy movies. 

Finally from sunny parking lot of a Santa Cruz hospital Philippe Kahn Jerry rigged or “macgyvered” if you will the very first Camera phone on June 11th 1997, through the use of his Motorola a micro camera and the wire to his cars speaker system Kahn sent 2,000 people simultaneous the first picture to be taken with a mobile phone of his daughter Sophie. This picture would go on to be included in the TIME Magazine’s 100 Most Influential Images of All Time.  

One of the major issues with the new camera phones was its ground breaking technology for the time. Many of the companies racing to create the best product struggled to fit both a phone camera and ability to connect in a similar device. At first most products had separate cameras and phones built and housed in the same structure. Bluetooth became utilized however was limited. Similar to regular cameras SD cards and USB cables could be used to upload photos taken on the phone to a computer. Over the next few years companies would begin attempting to integrate the phone and camera into a more seamless combination. 

This invention would be fairly overlooked the next few years companies did it but most considered it a novelty or a fad due to low quality pictures (started at 0.3 megapixels in comparison IPhone 15 48 megapixel camera) overall lack of need for it and high prices. Some other issues faced by the first camera phones included slower image transfer, poor low-light performance, limited functionality for example couldn’t zoom flash and many other settings seen on other cameras were not present. These phones were bulky and awkward to use and handle. Finally, the ease of taking photos with a phone worries people about their privacy. Most issues overtime would be fixed in this sense with more recent phones with more options and better graphics, lighting and less bulk, however privacy continues to be a major concern for many. 

Camera phones were somewhat unsuccessful however did change the phone industry. It started with smaller cameras on more phones. In a few years a phone became more than a phone. No longer did you have one only for calls or texts but to socialize on a deeper level. Without the invention of the camera phone we may never have created other world changing inventions like the smartphone. In fewer words camera phones walked so smartphones could run. 

Does anyone have any questions