Notices by Laura Kalbag (laura@mastodon.laurakalbag.com)

For those who won’t follow the link:
IAB Europe’s ad tracking consent framework found to fail GDPR standard

Maybe I’ve not been saying it loudly or frequently enough for the last however-many years…

Privacy is not a luxury.

Same with accessibility. Neither are luxuries, they’re life-sustaining rights. And you’re unusually privileged if you’ve not had to care about either.

So suddenly there’s a lot of attention around email and it’s exposing how many people in the web community still use Gmail. Like actually trust all your personal information and communication (and that of your potentially marginalised or vulnerable contacts) with Google. 🤮

There are a lot of hard problems and lack of alternatives when it comes to rights-respecting technology. But email (as imperfect as it is) has a fair few affordable alternative providers. Small change, big difference.

I’ve written a basic intro on how to read RSS in 2020, with some recommendations for feed readers.

(I started writing this a few weeks ago, but now might just be a great time to curate the news you want, and filter out the needlessly overwhelming stuff.)

https://laurakalbag.com/how-to-read-rss-in-2020/

“‘Google mentioning law enforcement at all in the Reuters announcement was a bit of a red herring, in other words, to distract from the everyday user data at stake,’ Burns added.”

Every tech policy article needs Heather Burns doing bullshit detection.

https://www.businessinsider.com/experts-react-google-brexit-decision-move-uk-data-to-the-us-2020-2

“It's a complete anomaly -- a solidly performing, decently priced device that just isn't suited for anyone because of the privacy concerns and increasingly alarming issues plaguing the social networking site.”

https://www.cnet.com/news/no-one-should-buy-the-facebook-portal-tv/

Spotted at Gatwick (annotation my own)…

“There is no time to waste. Authoritarian surveillance programs are always used to target the most vulnerable and marginalized, and facial recognition enables the automation of oppression.”

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/evangreer/dont-regulate-facial-recognition-ban-it

How to tell a true friend: they strip the tracking identifiers and amp junk from a url before sharing it with you.

Good read on the UK’s age verification porn block: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/apr/18/age-verification-block-porn-ethical-sites-sex

On Zuckerberg’s “privacy” announcement yesterday, I’ve only found one article in my RSS feed this morning worth reading… 🔥

https://techcrunch.com/2019/03/06/mark-zuckerberg-discovers-privacy/

My first attempt at doing this from scratch, I’ve made a little gingerbread shack. (Photo by @aral, including a sneaky Osky begging in the background.)

On the topic of these consent flows, here you can see an approved GDPR-compliant flow. It’s not worth it. It’s impossible to make a good experience out of gaining consent for collecting people’s personal data. It’s too risky and expensive to build a business model from it.

https://techcrunch.com/2018/12/13/this-early-gdpr-adtech-strike-puts-the-spotlight-on-consent/

Another goodie on 24ways, @scottohara covering ‘Inclusive Considerations When Restyling Form Controls’

https://24ways.org/2018/inclusive-considerations-when-restyling-form-controls/

This article explains well how our location data is used. While it goes into some detail on how children are also tracked, it doesn’t cover how dangerous this can be to vulnerable and marginalised people. Or how http://nytimes.com also exposes readers to similar trackers.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/12/10/business/location-data-privacy-apps.html (Also posted to @indie)

Still catching up with 24Accessibility posts for this year, but I just read Olivier Nourry’s on ‘How Ableism Leads to Inaccessibility’. It’s a must-read:

https://www.24a11y.com/2018/how-ableism-leads-to-inaccessibility/

This is a next-level anti-GDPR dark pattern from Forbes.

I selected that I only wanted the “required cookies” (no cookies should be required to read a text article.) “This may take up to a few minutes to process.” 🤔

Black Friday. The day you discover who didn’t really take you off their mailing lists in May…

And you know what… these data-collecting businesses have beautiful websites. There’s some really capable designers out there using their skills to help real life monsters.

Another joyless discovery: a tracker on an ordinary news site that shares your data to “carry out creditworthiness and risk assessment, for debt collection purposes.” FUN

Sorry, this work really stresses me out.