Self-Driving Drones, FRT Bans, and Xiongan's OS
Whose Streets? Our Streets! (Tech Edition) Issue 3
Whose Streets? Our Streets! (Tech Edition) documents trends in the surveillance of public space. Curated by Rebecca Williams and Madeleine Smith as part of "smart city" surveillance research for the Technology and Public Purpose Project at Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center. Subscribe now so you don’t miss an issue and help us spread the word to folks who would enjoy this content.
Let us know your favorite place to be surveilled. (This newsletter is about option 4, but all responses are valid).
City Watch
Chattanooga, TN, U.S. - “The Chattanooga Area Regional Transit Authority (CARTA) was recently awarded $3.9 million in grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) to continue research projects with Vanderbilt University and other academic partners to develop machine learning models for insights into how to best deploy electric buses and on-demand transit.” [Government Technology]
Chongqing, China - “Danish architecture firm BIG and Chinese tech company Terminus discussed plans to build an AI-run campus-style development in the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing during an online panel at Web Summit, a global tech conference. ‘It’s almost coming back to this idea of living in a village where, when you show up, even though it’s the first time you’re there, the bartender knows your favorite drink,’ said BIG founding partner Bjarke Ingels.” [Toronto Sun]
Chula Vista, CA, U.S. - “In one Southern California city, flying drones with artificial intelligence are aiding investigations while presenting new civil rights questions.” [NY Times]
San Diego, CA, U.S. - “Transparency not hallmark of Todd Gloria's top operators. Streetlight spycam spokeswoman picked as mayor's top media gatekeeper.” [San Diego Reader]
Xiongan, China - “JD unveils first phase of Xiongan smart city operating system for Xi Jinping’s city of the future. JD Digits, the e-commerce giant’s big data arm, is building up a smart city operating system that uses artificial intelligence. Alibaba, Tencent and Baidu all have their own plans for Xiongan, a smart city project personally backed by Chinese President Xi Jinping” [South China Morning Post]
Market Watch
Facial recognition -
“Facial Recognition Market worth $8.5 billion by 2025 - Exclusive Report by MarketsandMarkets.™” [PR Newswire]
“Facial recognition systems are getting better at recognizing masked faces. New data from NIST shows significant improvement since July.” [The Verge]
Camera cleaning - “A Safer Pathway to Camera and Sensor Maintenance. Tending to camera, sensor, and general surface cleaning maintenance – that is overdue – while staying safe.” [Security Today]
Crowdsourcing Google Maps’ Street View - “Google Maps is getting a new update that lets you create Street View photos using just a phone. Android users with ARCore-compatible devices can now capture imagery and publish it to Google Street View in certain areas. Google is allowing submissions initially in Toronto, New York, Austin, Nigeria, Indonesia, and Costa Rica.” [The Verge]
Mobility tech investment - “‘I think that venture investors are eager to participate in these companies that are developing entirely new ways for people and goods to move around,’ said Ben Marcus, a co-founder and managing partner for UP Partners.” [Government Technology]
Quantela invests in Graymatics - “California-based Quantela said in a statement the investment in Singapore- and India-based Graymatics, which also maintains a presence in the US, will provide it with a significant strategic and go-to-market alignment. It will also help Quantela in building out comprehensive capabilities in video analytics for its target markets, which include smart cities, education campuses, public spaces, and commercial establishments.” [VC Circle]
Redflex acquires an Israeli AI firm - “Redflex Goes AI With Transportation Tech Acquisition. The company, which offers many traffic enforcement tools, has bought out an Israeli computer vision company, signaling more sophisticated use of cameras, sensors and other roadway technology.” [Government Technology]
Smart street lights speculation - “The global smart street lighting market is expected to see $28.1 billion in total investment over the next decade, according to a new market forecast published this week by infrastructure intelligence firm Northeast Group.” [Smart Cities Dive]
Policy Watch
Baltimore, MD, U.S. - “Last week, EFF urged the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit to reconsider a split three-judge panel’s ruling that the Baltimore Police Department’s aerial surveillance of the city’s more than half a million residents is constitutional.” [EFF]
Madison, WI, U.S. - “The Madison City Council banned late Tuesday city agencies, including the Madison Police Department, from using facial recognition technology and also pushed back a decision on Edgewood High School's latest effort to install lights at its athletics field. On a 17-2 vote, the council approved a new ordinance that prohibits city agencies, departments and divisions from using facial recognition technology or "information derived from a face surveillance system" with a handful of exceptions.” [Wisconsin State Journal]
Massachusetts, U.S. - “Massachusetts on the verge of becoming first state to ban police use of facial recognition. The bill still requires signing by the state’s governor.” [The Verge]
New York, U.S. - “New York State lawmakers unanimously passed legislation (A10500C/S8450C) to protect New Yorkers cooperating with contact tracing efforts from having their data used against them in court proceedings or administrative hearings.” [EFF]
U.S. Federal - “Leaders who have pioneered smart technology in their own cities — like Rahm Emanuel of Chicago, Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles and Keisha Lance Bottoms of Atlanta — are top contenders to run the Department of Transportation, as Axios' Hans Nichols reports.” [Axios Cities]
U.S. Federal - “The federal government is secretly purchasing and using our cell phone location information to locate and track people in the United States, including for immigration enforcement. [The ACLU is] suing to bring some much-needed transparency to these disturbing practices...If law enforcement agencies can buy their way around the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement, the landmark protection announced by the Supreme Court in Carpenter will be in peril.” [ACLU]
U.S. Federal - The IoT Cybersecurity Improvement Act goes to the White House for signature. “By March 31, 2020, NIST must develop recommendations for the appropriate use and management of IoT devices owned or controlled by the government, including minimum information security requirements for managing cybersecurity risks...OMB shall then issue guidelines for each agency that are consistent with such recommendations. NIST and the OMB shall publish guidance on policies and procedures for the reporting...of information about a security vulnerability relating to an IoT device used by the government and the resolution of such security vulnerabilities.” [Congress.gov h/t @quantum_jake]
U.S. Federal - “Customs and Border Protection filed a new rule proposal in the Federal Register that would advance its biometric entry-exit system used to verify identities at ports beyond the pilot stage, and experts and lawmakers are weighing in on the implications of the new rule.” [Nextgov]
Various Global Cities - “What Should the EU Do to Better Protect Democracy in the Digital Age? – CDT’s Key Takeaways” considers GDPR, the EDAP, and the DSA collectively. [Center for Democracy and Technology]
Various Global Cities - “...the European Data Protection Board (“EDPB”) published two pieces of interrelated and eagerly-anticipated guidance regarding the export of personal data from the European Economic Area (“EEA”) to countries that have not been deemed to provide adequate protection for personal data and the rights and freedoms of data subjects under the GDPR. The guidance is subject to public consultation through December 21, 2020.” [JD Supra]
Various U.S. Cities - “In Los Angeles, officials moved aggressively to demand data from companies that want to operate bikes and scooters, and eventually, autonomous vehicles in the city. The idea was to require transportation companies to share very detailed information about how they were operating on streets, in exchange for permission to do so. The effort to create the data standard has spawned a nationwide controversy over privacy, power, and who gets to determine what cities will look like in the future.” [WIRED]
Watching the Watchers Watch
New York, NY, U.S. - Artist Brian House presented at Cities and Computers: Our Urban-Machinic Imaginaries on his project “Everything That Happens Will Happen Today (2017)” where he “[set] up the algorithmic view of the city in a seven-day performance ‘following’ the trajectories of a ‘plausible yet non-existent New Yorker,’ composed from the data of 1,000 anonymous residents” to explore the limits of “smart city” predictability. [Urban Omnibus]
Paris, France - “The beating came amid heated debates over a new security bill pushed by President Emmanuel Macron’s government, which includes a provision that prescribes a penalty of a year in prison and a fine of about $54,000 for anyone who broadcasts ‘the face or any other identifying element’ of police officers in action if the goal is to ‘physically or mentally harm’ them. Critics say that language is too open to interpretation and intended to discourage journalists and bystanders armed with smartphone cameras from documenting police brutality, amid growing criticism of aggressive police tactics and resistance from police unions.” [NY Times]
Bonus Section...Podcasts to Watch, um, Listen to
🔈 Podcast: Facial recognition is quietly being used to control access to housing and social services. [MIT Technology Review]
🔈 Podcast: From Your Face to Their Database [EFF]