
Ryan Calo is an assistant professor at the University of Washington School of Law and a former research director at CIS. A nationally recognized expert in law and emerging technology, Ryan's work has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, NPR, Wired Magazine, and other news outlets. Ryan serves on several advisory committees, including the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, and the Future of Privacy Forum. He co-chairs the American Bar Association Committee on Robotics and Artificial Intelligence and serves on the program committee of National Robotics Week.
Does NAI’s Opt Out Tool Stop Consumer Tracking?
By Ryan Calo on April 27, 2009 at 4:52 pm
I heard a rumor that I hope isn’t true. Specifically, I heard that opting out of behavioral profiling may not stop advertising companies from tracking you as you travel across the Web. Rather, according to the rumor, in many cases you merely opt out of seeing the tailored ads your web history might otherwise trigger.
The ability to opt out of behavioral profiling essentially underpins the argument for self-regulation by the industry. The idea is that (1) people like tailored ads and (2) those that worry about the practice, for instance, from a privacy perspective, can opt out of it. Setting aside the apparent frailty of cookie-based opt out (when you delete your cookies, you delete your opt out as well) and the availability of other means to track users (like flash cookies), this seems pretty straightforward and convincing.
But what does “opting out” mean, exactly? A close look at the Network Advertising Initiative website, which offers an opt out tool on behalf of most major online advertisers, turns up no guarantee that opting out will stop a company from logging where a user has traveled.
The True Danger Of The Internet: What Occurs To Us
By Ryan Calo on March 30, 2009 at 2:32 pm
The most interesting aspect of cyberspace is not what happens for a time to its visitors. It’s not the absence of regulation nor the presence of perfect regulation; it’s not the staggering variety of content nor the sudden arbitrariness of geography; it’s not the constant threat of surveillance nor the occasional absence of accountability. The most interesting aspect of cyberspace flows from its status as an engine of realization: cyberspace widens the range of what we think of as possible. The Web is home to phenomena that never quite happened before—not because the technology was untenable, but because no one thought to do it. The importance of cyberspace is not what occurs to you when you visit; it’s what occurs to you.
If you’ve visited Google’s physical campus in Mountain View, you likely noticed that the sign in procedure amounts to a click-wrap. Google requires that you accept a non-disclosure agreement, presented on monitors by the front door, before it will print you a visitor pass. It occurred to the Internet giant that it could treat its campus like an Internet service by requiring visitors to click-through a terms of use at the entry portal. This generates a record that you either agreed to play by the rules, or you were trespassing.
This is hardly an isolated example.
Yes, A Copyright Law Joke
By Ryan Calo on March 25, 2009 at 4:23 pm
You don't see a lot of law comics, much less comics about copyright law. Does this clever cartoon from across the Web describe an instance of fair use? You be the judge.
Have Fun Watching The Country
By Ryan Calo on March 13, 2009 at 9:12 pm
826 National is an incredible non-profit dedicated to improving writing and other skills among children ages to six to eighteen. A few days after the election of Barack Obama, 826 centers in seven cities asked children to offer advice to the new president. The result was the deservedly celebrated book Thanks And Have Fun Running The Country.
As you might imagine, this book is a major tour de cute. One 9-year-old in Los Angles opines that if he were president, he “would help all nations, even Hawaii.” A Seattle 7-year-old suggests that President Obama “turn on the heater, so it won’t be cold.” In short: awwwww.
You can imagine my surprise, then, when I came across the following suggestion from a Boston 12-year-old: “Dear, Barack Obama, … You should also build cameras all around our city to find out who is breaking the law, and also in movie theatres so we can tell who is making illegal copies.”
Wait, what??? Did the DOJ and RIAA have a child together? The rest of this writer’s suggestions are eminently reasonable—more power efficient cars, less smoking, and the like. Still, it’s not often that you see a 12-year-old proponent of ubiquitous surveillance!
Privacy And Free Speech (ACLU No. Cal. Primer)
By Ryan Calo on March 10, 2009 at 4:21 pm
The ACLU of Northern California has published a primer (PDF) on the advantages to businesses of good privacy and free speech practices. The primer assembles many real-world instances of harms and benefits to companies due to their choices around user privacy and value speech. Congratulations to Nicky, Chris, and no doubt others in putting this together.
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Is Tricking a Robot Hacking?
Abstract
The term “hacking” has come to signify breaking into a computer system. A number of local, national, and international laws seek to hold hackers accountable for breaking into computer systems to steal information or disrupt their operation. Other laws and standards incentivize private firms to use best practices in securing computers against attack.
The Courts Can Handle the Deadly Uber Self-Driving Car Crash
This article is adapted from a forthcoming peer-reviewed essay in Volume 61 of the Communications of the ACM.
Privacy, Vulnerability, and Affordance
INTRODUCTION
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Self-Driving Cars, Thinking Machines Will Test Limits Of Tort Law
"“Something goes wrong, but there’s no perpetrator,” said Ryan Calo, a professor at the University of Washington Law School who focuses on the intersection of tort law and technology, "because nobody intended this behavior.”
AI is an excuse for Facebook to keep messing up
"Beyond that, the kinds of content Zuckerberg focused on in the hearings were images and videos. From what we know about Facebook’s automated system, at its core, it’s a search mechanism across a shared database of hashes. If a video of a beheading goes up that has been previously been identified as terrorist content in the database — by Facebook or one of its partners — it’ll be automatically recognized and taken down.
Self-driving car deaths raise the question: Is society ready for us to take our hands off the wheel?
"To Ryan Calo, an expert in robotics and cyberlaw at the University of Washington Law School, many aspects of these questions are easy to answer, and the answer is yes.
A legal question for the AI age: Is tricking a robot the same thing as hacking it?
"Their paper considers a broad view of the legal definition of hacking under the CFAA, applying it even to previous work done by one of the co-authors, Yoshi Kohno. Kohno’s research, which coded DNA to hack a DNA sequencing machine could be viewed as hacking under the law, says co-author Ryan Calo.
Facebook's FTC probe rocked the stock. But will anything rein in Facebook?
""If I were Facebook, I would be quite nervous about popular sentiment," University of Washington law professor Ryan Calo said.
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8th Annual Privacy Papers for Policymakers (Past Event)
FPF is excited to announce that the 8th Annual Privacy Papers for Policymakers will open with remarks by
Exploring Augmented Reality (Past Event)
U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, will convene a hearing on Wednesday, November 16, 2016, at 3:00 p.m. entitled “Exploring Augmented Reality.” The hearing will examine the emergence, benefits, and implications of augmented reality technologies. Unlike virtual reality that creates a wholly simulated reality, augmented reality attempts to superimpose images and visual data on the physical world in an intuitive way.
Witnesses:
• Mr. Brian Blau, Research Vice President, Gartner
Artificial Intelligence: Law and Policy (Past Event)
The University of Washington School of Law is delighted to announce a public workshop on the law and policy of artificial intelligence, co-hosted by the White House and UW’s Tech Policy Lab. The event places leading artificial intelligence experts from academia and industry in conversation with government officials interested in developing a wise and effective policy framework for this increasingly important technology. The event is free and open to the public but requires registration. -
National Security: The Impact of Technology on the Separation of Powers (Past Event)
For more information visit the University of Chicago Law School website.
National Security: The Impact of Technology on the Separation of Powers
Taking Responsibility for One’s Own Data Privacy and Security–Is it Possible, and How? (Past Event)
For more information and to register visit the CTIC website.
8:30 – 9:00 a.m. Breakfast and Registration
9:00 – 9:15 a.m.
Welcome and Opening Remarks
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Drones fly faster than the law can keep up with
August 13, 2015
"“We don’t need to get to this crazy world in which robots are trying to take over in order for there to be really difficult, interesting complex legal questions,” says Ryan Calo, professor of law at the University of Washington, “That’s happening right now.”
Here’s a sample:
Privacy
“How do we make sure these drones are not recording things that they shouldn’t," Calo says, "and those things aren’t winding up .... on Amazon servers,or somehow getting out to the public or to law enforcement?"
Amazon's vision of a drone highway in the sky
July 29, 2015
"What will Amazon’s drone highway in the sky look like?
Probably not a drone highway. Amazon unveiled a proposal where low-level air space would be carved out for drones: 200 to 400 feet would be reserved for high-speed transit drones. Below, there would be space for low -speed local drone traffic, and above would be a no-fly buffer zone to keep drones out of manned-vehicle air space, aka flight paths.
Robots run new Chinese factory
July 28, 2015
Robots have been used in factories around the world for decades, often carrying out dangerous or highly repetitive operations. However the city of Dongguan, China, has become home to the first fully automated factory - where the workforce is made of up entirely of robots. Changying Precision Technology will only employ a small number of human staff who will monitor operations of the machinery, but all processes are completed by robotic equipment.
Is this a sign of things to come? Newsday spoke to Ryan Calo, a professor with the University of Washington Tech Policy Lab.
Popularity of Drones Raises Privacy Concerns
May 22, 2015
CIS Affiliate Scholar Ryan Calo on Good Morning America segment "Popularity of Drones Raises Privacy Concerns," many have reported drones with cameras invading their privacy.
Marketplace Tech for Monday, May 18, 2015
May 18, 2015
Ryan Calo, Assistant Law Professor at the University of Washington and an affiliate scholar at the Stanford Center for Internet and Society, talks about testing Google’s driverless cars.
Listen to the full show at Marketplace Tech.