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Julia Angwin
@JuliaAngwin
Investigative journalist. Founder of . Formerly , . Author of Dragnet Nation, Stealing MySpace. I'm more active at @julia@journa.host.
New Yorkjuliaangwin.comJoined October 2008

Julia Angwin’s Tweets

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Now more than ever trying to live by these rules: 📍Show Up 📍Pay Attention 📍Tell the Truth 📍Don’t be Attached to the Consequences
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AI also should not be deciding the line between acceptable and unacceptable speech, says. It's messy, it needs input from civil society, it's constantly shifting and culture specific. Because of that, he says, "AI has no role here." /end
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Other kinds of AI are far more dangerous, says, particularly ones that aim to predict social outcomes -- such as in hiring and criminal risk predictions. These types of AI should be considered "illegitimate and morally impermissible." /4
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However, doesn't believe that ChatGPT creates a doomsday scenario that destroys jobs and harms the economy - as some have warned. Even larger innovations such as the internet and smartphones haven't done that. This is not a "sky is falling" scenario, he says. /3
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ChatGPT's tenuous relationship with the truth means that it can be a dangerous creator of misinformation. Add economic pressures that force institutions to cut costs and rely on automated content creation and you have "a recipe for disaster" says . /2
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This kind of dangerous fear-mongering is on the rise in the United States. Think of the myth of the "great replacement" which claims there is a conspiracy to replace White people - a myth that prompted violence.
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Prior to the Rwandan genocide in 1994, Hutu politicians warned the Hutus that they were about to be exterminated by Tutsi cockroaches. Prior to the Holocaust, Nazi propagandists declared that Jews were planning to annihilate the German people.
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It is fear, more than hate speech, that often leads to mass violence. Leaders who seek to incite violence often create fake threats so that people will feel they must defend themselves.
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She hopes FB users will eventually be offered a yes/no option for ad profiling. Of course, even then, we could just end up with more annoying take-it-or-leave-it pop-up boxes that are not a true choice. As is always true with consent, it must be freely given to count. /end
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But Ireland’s economy is heavily dependent on Big Tech. And its regulator has a backlog of GDPR cases that have waited years for resolution. As activist tells me, “There is just never going to be political will to properly enforce GDPR in Ireland.” /4
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Earlier this month fined Meta €390 million for not getting proper consent before profiling FB & IG users. It was hailed a huge victory for EU’s landmark privacy law, GDPR, but sadly it may not change how you are profiled. /2
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Let’s talk about consent. Do you feel like you ever properly consented to being surveilled online constantly, having a profile built of your interests and having that profile made available to anyone who could pay for it? EU regulators don’t think so either. /1
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In the end it is always privacy for the rich and surveillance for the rest of us. twitter.com/osinttechnical
Screenshot of @Zoeschiffer tweet scoop: Twitter is working on a plan to force users to opt-in to personalized ads & share their location data. It is considering letting those who pay for Twitter Blue to opt-out of data sharing.
Tweet from @OSINTtechnical saying “It appears that all automated flight tracking accounts utilizing open source data from @ADBSexchange have been Banned from Twitter, including @RUOligarchJets.
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SCOOP w/ @CaseyNewton: Twitter is working on a plan to force users to opt-in to personalized ads & share their location data. It’s considering letting those who pay for Twitter Blue to opt-out of data sharing — a decision that would likely anger Apple: platformer.news/p/twitters-ris
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Entirely my pleasure! Loved working with you and will always be your biggest fan 🎉❤️
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Thank you @JuliaAngwin and @RinaPalta for taking a chance on me ♥️ And to my squad crew for holding it down @colinlecher @ToddFeathers @alfredwkng @tenuous @jonkeegan @ghongsdusit 🙌
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🚨Legend alert🚨 It was an honor to work with - an incredible reporter with unmatched commitment to exposing harms against the most vulnerable. Her series Working for an Algorithm sadly gets more relevant by the day. themarkup.org/series/working
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Today is my last day at @themarkup, where I can’t believe I was lucky enough to work for two years. I got to learn from a massively talented crew and was encouraged to write stories that highlighted worker voices. I’m so grateful. (I’ll say what’s coming next in the new year)
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“My avatars were cartoonishly pornified, while my male colleagues got to be astronauts, explorers, and inventors.” 😢
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I tried the viral Lensa AI portrait app, and got lots and lots of nudes. I know AI image generation models are full of sexist and racist biases, but this one really hit home. My latest story for @techreview technologyreview.com/2022/12/12/106
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Huge honor to speak to for the Markup, as her series of surveillance stories for the Wall Street Journal in early 2010s: “What they know” was a huge inspiration for and I while investigating our own stories on China’s surveillance state.
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"China’s surveillance state is like a panopticon, where the idea that you’re being tracked is more effective than the actual tracking mechanisms," @lizalinwsj tells me in this week's newsletter with @joshchin: themarkup.org/newsletter/hel
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Social control is the entire point of surveillance. So it doesn't matter *too much* how well it works. It matters more how afraid people are of being caught. That's why AI is a great surveillance tool. It's not always accurate but it can be good enough to scare people.
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