“San Francisco is the first American city to ban facial recognition software used by police and other agencies. Bloomberg QuickTake [YouTube] explains why the technology’s advance is so alarming to regulators, the public, and even the people developing it.”
See also: Government Is Using Most Vulnerable People to Test Facial Recognition Software; GAO Report – Facial Recognition Technology; and Yes, Americans can opt-out of airport facial recognition – and it is not easy.
The New York Times Opinion – Lesson One: Don’t let Trump take the initiative. By Jamelle Bouie “…I have been revisiting a few popular histories of the Civil War, both for personal interest and future work. It’s almost impossible to count all of the connections to make between that period, Reconstruction and present-day political life.… Continue Reading
Foreign Affiars – “For U.S. intelligence agencies, the twenty-first century began with a shock, when 19 al Qaeda operatives hijacked four planes and perpetrated the deadliest attack ever on U.S. soil. In the wake of the attack, the intelligence community mobilized with one overriding goal: preventing another 9/11. The CIA, the National Security Agency, and… Continue Reading
Axios: “The CIA, one of the rare government entities known for its social media savvy, is now on Instagram to give users another look into the secretive agency, Axios’ Marisa Fernandez writes. The new account is another online vehicle to “spark the curiosity of Instagram users” and find recruits, CIA press secretary Timothy Barrett said.… Continue Reading
CRS report via FAS – U.S. War Costs Casualties and Personnel Levels Since 9/11, April 18, 2019 “Seventeen years have passed since the U.S. initiated major military operations following the September 11, 2001,terrorist attacks. In the intervening period, operations first classified as Global War on Terror (GWOT) and later Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) have varied in… Continue Reading
BBC News – “The obstacles to President Donald Trump’s border wall are not confined to the four walls of Congress. As areas are cleared to start building new sections, some landowners, including a butterfly sanctuary, have sued to stop the construction…The butterfly centre…sits on 110 acres near the southern tip of Texas – an area… Continue Reading
Bloomberg: “Air passengers at a growing number of U.S. airports will no longer need to remove electronics, liquids, and other items from their carry-on luggage at security checkpoints as the Transportation Security Administration rolls out new technology. The TSA took a major step in a broader plan to revamp its overall screening process with faster,… Continue Reading
Belfer Center Project on Europe and the Transatlantic Relationship: “Approaching the seventieth anniversary of its founding in April 1949, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) remains the single most important contributor to security, stability and peace in Europe and North America. NATO provides the umbrella defending Europe from conventional and nuclear attack and a secure… Continue Reading
Looking to the Future, Public Sees an America in Decline on Many Fronts – Majorities predict a weaker economy, a growing income divide, a degraded environment and a broken political system “When Americans peer 30 years into the future, they see a country in decline economically, politically and on the world stage. While a narrow… Continue Reading
Paul M. Bisca, To End Poverty, Think Like a Spy, Brookings (March 11, 2019) – “To better manage the unknown, development professionals might want to take a leaf from the intelligence community book and draw inspiration from how spies try to predict the future. Reduced to its simplest terms, the CIA defines intelligence as “knowledge and… Continue Reading
Pudding – Russell Goldenberg: “There is always that one country on our collective conscious, and I wanted to know how that has changed over time. So I turned to the newspaper, since headlines have long been the catalyst for daily conversations about what is going on in the world. Most of that content is still… Continue Reading
The New York Times: “A military draft that applies only to men is unconstitutional, a federal judge in Houston has ruled, saying that excluding women is no longer justified because they can now serve in combat roles just as men do. Judge Gray H. Miller of Federal District Court in the Southern District of Texas… Continue Reading
