American digital rights NGO defending civil liberties in the internet age
A San Francisco business theft involving a Waymo driverless car remains unsolved months after a January incident. Police obtained video and account data but have not identified a suspect. The company says it does not use facial recognition and reviews requests for legal validity.
A Florida man has filed suit against multiple law-enforcement agencies for wrongful arrest and prosecution after a faulty facial-recognition match flagged him as a child-luring suspect at a Jacksonville Beach McDonald’s in August 2024. The case, now in federal court, alleges officers concealed exculpatory evidence and relied on a low-quality image from a screen grab. The plaintiff lives hundreds of miles away and says he never visited the site.
New York and California are pushing legislation to require firearm-blocking technology in 3D-printers to detect gun designs before printing. Critics warn it might not work and could raise privacy and rights concerns. The effort builds on a surge in privately made guns; a study group will assess feasibility before any mandate takes effect.
The Supreme Court has ruled that geofence warrants—used to identify suspects by collecting location data from people in a crime scene area—are subject to Fourth Amendment protections. The justices have affirmed that location data collected by third parties still warrants a warrant, focusing on privacy expectations in the digital age. The decision sends the case back to lower courts for further analysis.
The Claude AI share chats feature has allowed conversations to be indexed by search engines, exposing private or sensitive information. Anthropic has blocked indexing as of the latest updates, while publishers note users control sharing. The issue has highlighted risks around publicly shared chat links and search visibility.
Flock has announced changes to its license-plate reader network, making safeguards mandatory for law enforcement, shortening data retention to seven days, and requiring case codes to link searches to investigations. Critics say the measures still leave room for abuse, while supporters argue they enhance accountability and community values.