Washingtech Tech Policy Podcast With Joe Miller

Today’s global economy has made it easier than ever to explore opportunities and access resources. However, this comes with the challenge of understanding how these new markets and opportunities can be beneficial or harmful to your family. Technology is a powerful tool that can help you stay informed, connected, and entertained wherever you are in the world. As content from different countries and cultures becomes more accessible, it’s important for parents and caregivers to learn about new media so they can make informed decisions about what content is appropriate for their family. Bios Vicki Shotbolt @VShotbolt Vicki Shotbolt is the founder and CEO of Parent Zone which keeps families informed and works with partners on digital literacy issues. Sh’s worked with global brands including Microsoft and Vodafone to make Britain more Family Friendly. Her passion is in finding practical solutions to complex problems.She often speaks publicly about parenting and digital issues and is on the executive board of the UK

Fifth Circuit Upholds State of Texas’ Content Moderation Ban The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a lower court ruling to strike down the State of Texas’ controversial statute that created a private right of action for anyone who thinks they were banned from a social media platform because of their “viewpoint.” With the Texas law back in effect, platforms with more than 50 million users, like Twitter & YouTube, must notify users in Texas when they remove their content and give them a chance to appeal. If the user isn’t happy with the decision, they can sue. Experts are now waiting to hear whether the Supreme Court will take up the case. In the meantime, Elon Musk Tweeted earlier today that his acquisition of Twitter is on hold as he seeks to verify that fewer than 5% of its accounts are fake. And the number of conservative users who re-joined Twitter after Musk announced he’d be acquiring the company skyrocketed, according to the Washington Post. State of Virginia Lifts Facial Recognition Ban

Afua Bruce is a leading public interest technologist whose career has spanned the government, non-profit, private, and academic sectors, as she has held senior science and technology positions at the White House, the FBI, IBM, and the nonprofit sector. Her new book, The Tech That Comes Next: How Changemakers, Philanthropists, and Technologists Can Build an Equitable World, explores how technology can advance equity. Resources The Tech that Comes Next: How Changemakers, Philanthropists can Build a More Equitable World by Amy Sample Ward and Afua Bruce @afua_bruce

Tech companies use data to spot patterns in their users’ search histories. They use this information to understand how customers behave. But in the 6 years since the Cambridge Analytica scandal happened, the details of how tech companies use our data are still murky. Ranking Digital Rights’ Jessica Dheere joined Joe Miller to discuss where the gaps are and what the public needs to know. Bio Jessica Dheere is the Director of Ranking Digital Rights. She founded and was Executive Director of SMEX, the Middle East's leading digital rights research and advocacy organization.  In 2018, she was a research fellow at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society. and a Technology and Human Rights Fellow at Harvard Carr Center for Human Rights Policy. She was part of the 2019-20 cohort of Technology and Human Rights Fellows at Harvard’s Carr Center for Human Rights Policy. Her publications include “Misguiding Multistakeholderism: A Nongovernmental Perspective on the Arab IGF”, and a legal research methodology for

With the convergence of the Metaverse, Web 3.0 and the blockchain, it’s hard to imagine just how far we have come over the last century. We can’t fully appreciate this giant leap forward, without examining the origins of the internet. Who better to help us understand this journey and how we got where we are today than Dr. Vinton Cerf. Dr. Cerf, widely considered “One of the Fathers of the Internet,” helped to develop the TCP/IP protocol. Since 2005, Dr. Cerf has served as Google’s vice president and chief Internet evangelist. He identifies new technologies to support the development of advanced, Internet-based products and services. Dr. Cerf is the former Senior Vice President of Technology Strategy for MCI. There, he guided MCI’s technical strategy. In December 1997, President Clinton presented the U.S. National Medal of Technology to Cerf and his colleague, Robert E. Kahn, for founding and developing the Internet. In 2004, Drs. Kahn and Cerf won the Alan M. Turing Award for their work on the Internet protoc

We are in the middle of a disruptive tech revolution, and it will take some time for society to adjust. Tech, media, and telecom companies turn to Jonathan Cohen for advice as they navigate a continually shifting legal, technological and political landscape. Decades of transactional and policy experience (in private practice and in government) enable him to efficiently advise clients regarding strategies and details in their dealings with other industry players, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), and other executive branch agencies to align the private sector with the public interest. His expertise ranges from media (both traditional and social) to broadband wireless, and from commercial transactions to regulatory policy. Mr. Cohen’s government service included stints at The White House and the FCC, and he is an expert in platform regulation issues, spectrum licensing and transactions, and the rules and processes governing participation in FCC auctions. His clients have singled out his “outstanding

The way you process information will affect your survival. It’s just a fact. Without the ability to evaluate information through a critical lens, it's hard to discern fact from fiction. Kyle Williams and Kamal Carter of A Long Talk About An Uncomfortable Truth joined Joe Miller to discuss their work to go beyond critical race theory. In partnership with colleges and universities, Mr. Williams and Mr. Carter teach important facts about America’s racial history. These facts are missing from most K-12 history curricula in the United States. Through their efforts to promote awareness about what Black people experience in their day-to-day lives, Mr. Williams and Mr. Carter seek to promote empathy. Over the last 19 months, A Long Talk has reached over 4,000 people. But their goal is to bring their expertise to every kitchen table in America. Links: A Long Talk      Book: Antisocial by Andrew Marantz  A Long Talk is on all social media platforms @ALongTalk2020 A Long Talk on LinkedIn  

A lack of a unifying federal privacy law in the U.S. like the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and a growing patchwork of state regulations to keep track of, can make it tricky for your business to maintain compliance. This is exactly why we have today’s guest here to help us navigate the difficult eco-system of state privacy laws. Donata Stroink-Skillrud is the President of Termageddon and the engineer behind Termageddon’s policy questions and text. She is a licensed attorney and a certified information privacy professional. She often volunteers at the Illinois State Bar Association holding courses on the General Data Protection Regulation where she teaches other attorneys on the importance of privacy and what Privacy Policies should contain. Trusting Companies With Your Data Privacy and protecting your personal data has probably shown up on your radar a lot lately because of the number of merchants that have reported data breaches. Target had a huge data breach of 40 million custo

You’re well aware that this podcast is about public policy and so often we focus on that, but today, we’re also bringing you the creative side of policy making. So many of the policies that we fight to implement are created as a way to protect and preserve our ability to be creative. We know that for many professionals, it’s hard to be able to live a completely creative life, while balancing it with work and earning a living.   In a podcast first, we begin today’s episode with a poem by our guest, Anita Balaraman. The poem is called “Doubt” and you can read it on Medium.com.   Anita never specifically sought out a creative life. Anita is a technology product leader with more than 10 years of experience in building technology products that delight the customer both in the B2B and B2C domain. She is also an adjunct faculty at UC Berkeley, teaching and coaching hi-tech product management. She is currently the founder of an early stage ed-tech startup. Most recently she led the digital customer experience practi

Now more than ever we need to protect our kids as they have more exposure online than ever before. Children’s Online Safety is a priority that we are taking very seriously.  We’re living in a hyperconnected age and we’ve got the Metaverse bearing down on us, so online safety for our children needs to be the first priority. It wasn't during Web2. Today's guest is Dana Miller, the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force Commander, with the Wisconsin Department of Justice. She joins me to talk about her career, some more tips on how to interact with your kids to protect them online, and what kinds of issues policymakers should be paying attention to as the internet evolves. Dana has worked in ICAC since 2014 and manages the Wisconsin ICAC Task Force Program, including oversight of Wisconsin CyberTips from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and the ICAC Victim Services Program. Prior to joining the ICAC Task Force, Dana worked for the University of Wisconsin-Platteville’s Criminal Justi

When the pandemic started, courts that were slower in adopting technology had to undergo a two-week revolution to move their operations to a remote setting. Under normal circumstances, that would have taken them twenty years to achieve.  Existing research shows that while remote technologies can be helpful in court proceedings, they can also harm individuals if not used carefully. Several issues have been coming up around the effects that remote court proceedings have had on our communities. Today’s guest is Douglas Keith, counsel in the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program, where he works primarily on promoting fair, diverse, and impartial courts. He will walk us through the various concerns. Douglas Keith was the George A. Katz Fellow at the Brennan Center, where he worked on issues around money in politics, voting rights, and redistricting. His work has been featured in the New York Times, Washington Post, NPR, Atlantic, Guardian, New York Daily News, and Huffington Post. Before that, Keith worked as a Ford

WashingTECH Policy Podcast was started largely because of the impact of tech, AI and cybersecurity on communities of color, working class and immigrants, and none of the big players in the industry have it on their radar. Our conversation today is on this very topic and there is no one more knowledgeable on the topic than Camille Stewart. Camille Stewart is an attorney and executive whose crosscutting perspective on complex technology, cyber, and national security, and foreign policy issues has landed her in significant roles at leading government and private sector companies like the Department of Homeland Security, Deloitte, and Google. Camille builds global cybersecurity, privacy, and election security/integrity programs in complex environments for large companies and government agencies. Camille is the Global Head of Product Security Strategy at Google advising Google’s product leads on federated security and risk. Previously, Camille was the Head of Security Policy for Google Play and Android at Google

Some of the earliest documented instances of health misinformation occurred as early as the 1930s. So it’s not as recent of a phenomenon as you may think. Obviously, social media has made the speed and prevalence of health misinformation and disinformation much worse. It started with cancer misinformation, but now we are dealing with vaccine misinformation and of course, the battle field is social media. All of the medical and technological advances we have made as a first world country don’t make a difference if we can’t overcome the health disinformation that is prevalent on social media. Today’s guest is Dr. Tara Sell. Dr. Sell is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Environmental Health and Engineering and a Senior Associate at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She conducts research to develop a greater understanding of potentially large-scale health events such as disease outbreaks, bioterrorism, natural disasters, or radiological

Across the US, many states are considering laws that prohibit online platforms like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, etc. from enforcing rules against what we call “lawful but awful” online content. Lawmakers are motivated to do this because they think laws are needed to prevent social media platforms from censoring conservative viewpoints. As with many laws though, the unintended consequences of these laws could prove to be much more harmful than the behavior the law was intended to regulate. To help us navigate the craziness of what would and would not be allowed if these laws go through, our guest today is Elizabeth Banker, VP of Legal Advocacy for Chamber of Progress. Chamber of Progress is also a sponsor of this show. Elizabeth Banker is Vice President of Legal Advocacy for Chamber of Progress. Elizabeth brings twenty-five years of in-house, law firm, and trade association experience on intermediary liability, Section 230, and online safety. Most recently, Elizabeth was Deputy General Counsel at Internet A

With Federal privacy regulation leaving much to be desired, it has fallen to individual states to make up the gap and establish their own privacy rules. This approach is problematic for many reasons, which is why Justin Brookman is on the show today. Correction: The name of the individual Joe referenced in the intro is Alex Stamos, from the Stanford Internet Observatory, not John Stamos as was stated in the episode Consumer Privacy Has a Home a Consumer Reports Justin Brookman is with Consumer Reports where he's the head of tech policy. He wrote an excellent paper several months ago on state privacy regulation (you can read it here). Justin is the Director, Consumer Privacy and Technology Policy, for Consumers Union, the policy and advocacy arm of Consumer Reports. In this new privacy role at CR, he will help the organization continue its groundbreaking work to shape the digital marketplace in a way that empowers consumers and puts their data privacy and security needs first. This work includes using CR rese

CDT Comments to US Dept. of ED Urging the Protection of Students of Color and Students with Disabilities, And Their Data @venzkec Cody Venzke is a Policy Counsel for CDT’s Equity in Civic Technology Project, where he works to ensure that education agencies and other civic institutions use technology responsibly and equitably while protecting the privacy and civil rights of individuals. He is a contributor to the California Lawyers Association’s treatise on the California Consumer Privacy Act, including on the right to opt out and compliance with recordkeeping and training requirements. Prior to joining CDT, Cody served as an Attorney Advisor at the Federal Communications Commission and clerked for the Honorable Julio M. Fuentes on the Third Circuit and the Honorable Jan E. DuBois in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.  Cody also worked on the litigation team of an international law firm, where he served clients in emerging technologies such as clean energy, medicine, and media.  In his pro bono work, Cody

  Margaret graduated cum laude from the University of Minnesota Law School in 2003 and began her legal career with the Housing Preservation Project. She began her career as a community organizer, fighting for the rights of manufactured home community members with All Parks Alliance for Change. After law school, Margaret joined HJC under its former name Housing Preservation Project, where she worked on a range of issues including preservation of federally subsidized housing and manufactured home community preservation. She then returned to APAC as the Legal and Public Policy Director where she helped resident associations fight for their rights in parks, represented resident associations in court, and helped push legislation to support manufactured homeowners, including a law that prevented deceptive lending practices and creation of the relocation trust fund for homeowners displaced through park closures. Next, she spent four years at the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs as the Operations Director for t

  Justin Hendrix is CEO and Editor of Tech Policy Press, a new nonprofit media venture concerned with the intersection of technology and democracy. Previously, he was Executive Director of NYC Media Lab. He spent over a decade at The Economist in roles including Vice President, Business Development & Innovation. He is an associate research scientist and adjunct professor at NYU Tandon School of Engineering.

  Bio David J. Johns is known for his passion, public policy acumen and fierce advocacy for youth. He is an enthusiast about equity—leveraging his time, talent and treasures to address the needs of individuals and communities often neglected and ignored. A recognized thought leader and social justice champion, David’s career has focused on improving life outcomes and opportunities for Black people. On September 1, 2017, David Johns began his next life chapter as the executive director of the National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC)—a civil rights organization dedicated to the empowerment of Black lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) people, including people living with HIV/AIDS. NBJC’s mission is to end racism, homophobia, and LGBTQ bias and stigma. In 2013, Johns was appointed as the first executive director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for African Americans (Initiative) by President Barack H. Obama and served until the last day of the Obama Administration i