blogpost

Shopping in the Digital Age – a Psychological Battle

Shopping in the Digital Age – a Psychological Battle by Krissy Gianforte | 14 October 2018 Imagine your last trip to Target. You entered the store with your shopping list in-hand, intending to buy “just a few things”. As you walked down the aisles, though, extra items caught your eye – a cute coffee mug, or a soft throw blanket… [Read more...]

Hiding in Plain Sight: A Tutorial on Obfuscation

Hiding in Plain Sight: A Tutorial on Obfuscation by Andrew Mamroth | 14 October 2018 In 2010, the Federal Trade Commission pledged to give internet users the power to determine if or when websites were allowed to track their behavior. This was the so called “Do Not Track” list. Now in 2018, this project has been sidelined and widely ignored… [Read more...]

Alternative measures of credit risk

Alternative measures of credit risk  by Simon Hodgkinson People in developing economies can increasingly use their private information as a way to secure credit, but is this a good thing? Easy access to credit is essential to the proper functioning of many high-income economies. Governments, corporations, and individuals all rely on the ability to borrow money. Lenders offer credit based… [Read more...]

Social Credit: a Chinese experiment

Social Credit: a Chinese experiment by Yang Yang Qian Imagine applying for a loan, but first the bank must check your Facebook profile for a credit report. As odd as it feels for consumers in the United States, for consumers in China, this is already part of an experiment with social credit. The Chinese government has had plans to implement… [Read more...]

Bad Blood: Trusting Numbers with a Grain of Salt

Bad Blood: Trusting Numbers with a Grain of Salt by Amy Lai Digital health may be well on its way toward becoming the next “it” trend in technology. Over the past few years, the presence of consumer health technology companies has boomed. In 2010, digital health companies received roughly $1 billion in total investment funding, a less than hefty amount… [Read more...]

From Safety to Surveillance: When is it Okay to Spy on Your Kids?

From Safety to Surveillance: When is it Okay to Spy on Your Kids? by Elizabeth Shulok Imagine hiding a webcam in your teenager’s bedroom and recording them unaware. Most of us would recognize this as an invasion of privacy, and potentially child pornography if the camera records the child in a state of undress. But install a webcam in your… [Read more...]

Privacy and Anti-Trust

Privacy and Anti-Trust by Todd Young I have long been concerned about what mergers and acquisitions mean for privacy agreements.  Beyond my concerns about the notice-and-consent framework[1], it seemed to me that a change of ownership of the firm, as in the case of a merger or acquisition, is particularly problematic for individual privacy.  After all, people agree… [Read more...]