Friend,
S.T.O.P. made national and global headlines in 2023. This past year, we were quoted over 300 times, and we had 27 op-eds featured. Here is a lookback at a few points that stuck out.
On AI
AI dominated headlines in 2023, as the technology was rapidly being developed for increasingly dangerous purposes. S.T.O.P.'s advocacy against AI-assisted hiring tools, and the dubious audit systems meant to mitigate their biases, was featured by The New York Times and Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. “We don’t trust companies to self-regulate when it comes to pollution, we don’t trust them to self-regulate when it comes to workplace comp. Why on earth would we trust them to self-regulate AI?” said Albert Fox Cahn on an episode of the HBO late-night series with over 9 million YouTube views.
See more of S.T.O.P.’s comments on AI in The New York Times, Associated Press (twice!), NBC News, Fox News, MSNBC, The Boston Globe, Forbes, The Atlantic, & MIT Technology Review.
On Facial Recognition
In 2023, New Yorkers witnessed widespread and unchecked usage of facial recognition, a highly invasive and biased surveillance technology. “New York has given businesses free rein to use facial recognition in their properties. And it was only a matter of time before we saw owners using it to retaliate this way,” said Albert Fox Cahn about Madison Square Garden’s use of facial recognition in a statement for NPR. Speaking to The Washington Post about the technology’s 2024 rollout at airport checkpoints across the country, Cahn stated: “we’re moving ever closer to a world where the price of protecting your privacy at the airport is truly unconscionable and exhausting delays: paying for your privacy with your time.”
Catch more of what S.T.O.P. has to say about facial recognition in Rolling Stone, NBC News, Politico, Vice (twice!), The Guardian, Popular Science, Slate, & Wired.
On Drones
Drone usage tripled in New York in 2023, as the Adams Administration opted to purchase more of the expensive tech toys – and deploy them for evermore questionable purposes. In September, NYPD dispatched a new fleet of aerial drones to monitor Labor Day festivities. “This is incredibly invasive, and may be unconstitutional,” said Albert Fox Cahn on Good Morning America. “We are going to see drones flying in the same neighborhoods that the NYPD has always targeted.” In their coverage of the controversy, The Washington Post also featured a statement from S.T.O.P.
View S.T.O.P.’s other statements about drones in The New York Times (twice!), NPR, Associated Press, Los Angeles Times, The Guardian, Politico, & Vice.
On Geofence Warrants
These days, non-divisive legislation is few and far between, especially if that legislation aims to tamp down on unchecked policing. But a growing nationwide effort to ban reverse location searches, also known as geofence warrants, may be the exception, as Albert Fox Cahn and Nina Loshkajian explain in Slate: “Geofence searches are so offensive to the Constitution that this campaign could provide a playbook for bringing both parties together on other privacy issues.” Several other national outlets, including The Washington Post, also featured S.T.O.P.'s advocacy against the wildly unconstitutional surveillance practice.
Read more of what S.T.O.P. has to say about geofence warrants in The Guardian, The Huffington Post, The Hill, Gizmodo, Times Union, & She Knows.
On Surveillance Transparency
The NYPD continues to flout calls and legislation for transparency in policing. Not only did the department repeatedly dodge the City Council hearing on their violations of the Public Oversight of Surveillance Technology (POST) Act this year, they also opted to spend $500 million to encrypt their radio transmissions. “The idea that we’re going to turn this sort of vital information into something that’s only accessible to the public at the whims of police is just truly chilling,” said Albert Fox Cahn to the New York Times in November of last year.
Read up on S.T.O.P.’s surveillance transparency advocacy in Vice, The City (twice!), Gothamist (twice!), & Tech Policy Press.
On Social Media Surveillance
The internet can be a dangerous place for kids, but the recent scourge of state bills requiring youth to undergo invasive age verification and parental consent procedures are only going to exacerbate the issue, denying web access to some and jeopardizing the privacy of many. This legislation is most poised to negatively impact LGBTQ+ youth, Albert Fox Cahn explains in a statement for CNN, “outing them to homophobic or transphobic parents and cutting them off from their digital community.”
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In Solidarity,
Sarah Roth
Advocacy & Communications Associate
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