Albany Day Newsletter

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Dear *|FNAME|*, We’re a week into the new year, and our elected leaders are pushing for more mass data collection, more faulty technologies, and more surveillance of New Yorkers: “Big Brother is protecting you,” Mayor Adams said this week, repeating a creepy reference made by Governor Hochul in late 2022. At S.T.O.P., we have our own New Year’s resolutions for New York. We’re calling on lawmakers in Albany to choose safety over surveillance in 2023 by adopting a slate of anti-surveillance bills. The package is made up of several bills, including: Banning “Geofence” Warrants: Unconstitutional “geofences” allow police to seize data on limitless people in a defined geographic space of any size over any time – like immigration offices, houses of worship, or even reproductive health clinics. Ending Unofficial DNA Databases & Phenotyping: NYPD maintains an illegal database of New Yorkers’ DNA, built through deceptive and coercive policing practices. Police also use DNA phenotyping, a pseudoscientific imaging tool, to predict what the suspect of a crime might look like, including what race they may be. This practice is ripe for abuse, and can lead to wrongful arrests and convictions. Making New York a True Sanctuary State: New York is failing on its promise to protect immigrant communities, as its state and local agencies collude with ICE, disclose personal data, and divert resources to federal immigration enforcement. We’re calling on state lawmakers to prohibit these anti-immigrant practices and create a New York For All. Banning Biometric Surveillance: Facial recognition is biased and broken, with error rates for women of color nearly 100 times that of white men. Several Black men – that we know of – have been wrongly arrested after a false match. S.T.O.P. and our partners are headed to Albany on Monday, January 9 to officially launch our campaign, which we call “Banning Big Brother.” Your support can help us get there – and help us reign in government surveillance in 2023. With thanks, David Siffert Legal Director  Share Tweet Forward