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Category Archives: Government Documents

What’s Missing From Railroad Safety Data?

ProPublica – Dead Workers and Severed Limbs. “…But, as ProPublica has previously reported, railroad companies go to extreme lengths to portray themselves as safer than they really are — retaliating against workers who report defects and silencing those who get injured. Officials with the FRA [Federal Railway Administration] have said there is not much they can do about the forces — like the financial implications of appearing to admit liability and a culture that faults managers when employees get hurt on their watch — that can drive companies to quash injury reporting. This tranche of missing injuries and deaths, however, exposes the clearest failure by regulators to hold companies accountable. Much of the problem stems from the FRA’s porous reporting policies, which ProPublica found provide opportunities for companies to hide work-related injuries and deaths. Officials say they have spent the past five years working on revisions, which they plan to unveil this year. They said disclosing the details now would be a breach of the rulemaking process, but they mentioned that their changes could address issues raised by ProPublica’s reporting. ProPublica’s findings show the powerful rail companies have long benefitted from loopholes…”

State of the science on plastic chemicals

PlastChem – Identifying and addressing chemicals and polymers of concern. “Chemicals are a central aspect of the plastics issue. Although there is a wealth of scientific information on plastic chemicals and polymers to inform policymakers, implementing this evidence is challenging because information is scattered and not easily accessible. The PlastChem report and database address this… Continue Reading

IP – Stronger Fraud Risk Management Could Improve the Integrity of Trademark System

Intellectual Property: Stronger Fraud Risk Management Could Improve the Integrity of the Trademark System. Published: Mar 14, 2024. Publicly Released: Mar 14, 2024. “…The Trademark Modernization Act of 2020 (TMA) established two new procedures—expungement and reexamination—that allow individuals and businesses to challenge a registered trademark on the basis that it was not used in commerce,… Continue Reading

Illinois Task Force Explores How AI Could Speed Up Litigation

Bloomberg: “Generative artificial intelligence could boost the Illinois judiciary by helping judges produce opinions faster and assist individuals in better preparing their own cases, members of a new Illinois AI task force said. The Illinois Judicial Conference task force, created in January, is meeting monthly to discuss how generative AI could help the court system… Continue Reading

Caselaw Access Project

“The Caselaw Access Project (“CAP”) expands public access to U.S. law. Our goal is to make all published U.S. court decisions freely available to the public online, in a consistent format, digitized from the collection of the Harvard Law School Library. We created CAP’s initial collection by digitizing roughly 40 million pages of court decisions… Continue Reading

Annual Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community

February 5, 2024 – Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI): “This annual report of worldwide threats to the national security of the United States responds to Section 617 of the FY21 Intelligence Authorization Act (Pub. L. No. 116-260). This report reflects the collective insights of the Intelligence Community (IC), which is committed every… Continue Reading

House Committee Approves Bill Restricting Sales of Sensitive Data to Foreign Adversaries

EPIC: “March 7, 2024 the House Energy & Commerce Committee approved H.R. 7520, the Protecting Americans’ Data from Foreign Adversaries Act of 2024, sponsored by Representative Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ) and Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA). The bill prohibits data brokers from selling, transferring, or providing access to Americans’ sensitive data to certain foreign adversaries… Continue Reading

A.I. Joe: The Dangers of Artificial Intelligence and the Military

Public Citizen: “The U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) and the military-industrial complex are rushing to embrace an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven future. There’s nothing particularly surprising or inherently worrisome about this trend. AI is already in widespread use and evolving generative AI technologies are likely to suffuse society, remaking jobs, organizational arrangements and machinery. At the… Continue Reading

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 9, 2024

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 9, 2024 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex… Continue Reading

Privacy First and Competition

EFF- Cory Doctorow: “Privacy First” is a simple, powerful idea: seeing as so many of today’s technological problems are also privacy problems, why don’t we fix privacy first? Whether you’re worried about kids’ mental health, or tech’s relationship to journalism, or spying by foreign adversaries, or reproductive rights, or AI deepfakes, or nonconsensual pornography, you’re… Continue Reading

FTC Cracks Down on Mass Data Collectors: A Closer Look at Avast, X-Mode, InMarket

“Three recent FTC enforcement actions reflect a heightened focus on pervasive extraction and mishandling of consumers’ sensitive personal data. Proposed Settlements with Avast X-Mode and InMarket. In mid February, the FTC announced a proposed settlement to resolve allegations that Avast, a security software company, unfairly sold consumers’ granular and re-identifiable browsing information—information that Avast amassed… Continue Reading