Skip Navigation

User banner

The Nexus of Privacy

@ thenexusofprivacy @lemmy.sdf.org

Posts
26
Comments
46
Joined
3 yr. ago

  • Microsoft endorses anti-LGBTQ online "child safety" bill KOSA night before Big Tech hearing (US Politics)

    Jump

  • The law's defintion of harm is extremely broad. Charlie Jane Anders has a good discussion of this in The Internet Is About to Get a Lot Worse:

    "This clause is so vaguely defined that attorneys general can absolutely claim that queer content violates it — and they don't even need to win these lawsuits in order to prevail. They might not even need to file a lawsuit, in fact. The mere threat of an expensive, grueling legal battle will be enough to make almost every Internet platform begin to scrub anything related to queer people."

  • Microsoft endorses anti-LGBTQ online "child safety" bill KOSA night before Big Tech hearing (US Politics)

    Jump

  • In practice, when the AG threatens to sue and the law makes it clear that they'll win (which KOSA currently does), companies will typically stop what they're doing (or settle if the AG actually launches a suit)

  • Microsoft endorses anti-LGBTQ online "child safety" bill KOSA night before Big Tech hearing (US Politics)

    Jump

  • Microsoft endorses anti-LGBTQ online "child safety" bill KOSA night before Big Tech hearing (US Politics)

    Jump

  • Yep. There's money to be made here!

  • Microsoft endorses anti-LGBTQ online "child safety" bill KOSA night before Big Tech hearing (US Politics)

    Jump

  • Great point. Mike Masnick has said that he wouldn't be surprised if Meta also comes out in support, for similar reasons.

  • Microsoft endorses anti-LGBTQ online "child safety" bill KOSA night before Big Tech hearing (US Politics)

    Jump

  • Totally agreed that it opens things up to censorship in general and doesn't actually make kids safer. Charlie Jane Anders' The Internet Is About to Get A Lot Worse sets it in the context of book banning. The LGBTQ part is in the headlines because one big focus of the advocacy against it is highlighting that Democrats who claim to be pro-LGBTQ should not be backing this bill. This has been effective enough that Senators Cantwell and Markey both mentioned it in the committee markup, although it's certainly far from the only problem with the bill.

    Sec. 11 (b): Enforcement By State Attorneys General covers this. It's hard to find -- the bill text starts out with all the text removed from the previous amendment, and if you click on the "enforcement" link in the new table of context it takes you to the old struck-out text. It's almost like they want to make it as hard as possible for people to figure out what's going on!

  • Microsoft endorses anti-LGBTQ online "child safety" bill KOSA night before Big Tech hearing (US Politics)

    Jump

  • They get to position themselves as looking out for the children.

  • LGBTQ+ @beehaw.org
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    Microsoft endorses anti-LGBTQ online "child safety" bill KOSA night before Big Tech hearing (US Politics)

    gazette.com /news/wex/microsoft-president-endorses-online-child-safety-bill-night-before-big-tech-hearing/article_cd2e8eb5-ba98-5e95-9333-5646dd6a249f.html
  • Technology @lemmy.world
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    Microsoft endorses anti-LGBTQ online "child safety" bill KOSA night before Big Tech hearing (US Politics)

    gazette.com /news/wex/microsoft-president-endorses-online-child-safety-bill-night-before-big-tech-hearing/article_cd2e8eb5-ba98-5e95-9333-5646dd6a249f.html
  • politics @lemmy.world
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    Florida House of Representatives approves bill to ban social media for kids under 16

    abcnews.go.com /GMA/Family/florida-house-representatives-approves-bill-ban-social-media/story

  • A script for asking Republican Senators to stop KOSA (US Politics)

    Jump

  • Yes, exactly. For Senators who support LGBTQ+ rights and reproductice rights (or at least say that they do), focusing on the threat anti-trans AGs can be very effective; In Washington state, we put enough pressure on Cantwell last fall about the LGBTQ+ issues that she mentioned it in the hearing (as did Markey). 5calls and EFF's scripts and emails are written to appeal to legislators from both parties (so just talk about the harms to kids and threats from state AGs in general terms), which makes sense for a one-size-fits-all form, but customizing it to your Senators' priorities can make a lot of sense.

  • Technology @lemmy.world
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    A script for asking Republican Senators to stop KOSA (US Politics)

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • That's great! And a lot of trans people I've talked with on Mastodon say similar things, which is also great. But a lot don't. It depends a lot on the instance you wind up choosing. So the people who stay wind up as a self-selecting sample.

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • Thanks, glad you liked it. Agreed that blocklists (while currently necessary) have big problems, it would really be great if we had other good tools and they were much more of a last resort ... I'll talk more about that in a later installment.

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • Total bullshit response. Yes, there are a lot of LGBT people on the fediverse. There's also a lot of homophobia and transphobia on the fediverse. And the instances run by nazis and terfs very much care if you're trans and will harass you just as much on the fediverse as anywhere else.

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • It's tricky ... many people do use "queer" as an umbrella term, but a lot of trans people don't like being lumped under that, and some lesbian, gay, bi, and agender people don't consider themselves queer. There aren't great answers.

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • At some level you're not missing anything: there are obvious solutions, and they're largely ignored. Blocking is effective, and it's a key part of why some instances actually do provide good experiences; and an allow-list approach works well. But, those aren't the default; so new instances don't start out blocking anybody. And, most instances only block the worst-of-the-worst; there's a lot of stuff that comes from large open-registration instances like .social and .world that relatively few instances block or even limit.

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • I didn't say the fediverse has come a long way. I said that many people on well-moderated instances have good experiences -- which has been true since 2017. In general though I'd say there was a brief period of rapid progress on this front in the early days of Mastodon in 2016/2017, and since then progress has been minimal. Lemmy for example has much weak moderation functionality than Mastodon. Akkoma, Bonfire, Hubzilla etc are better but have minimal adoption.

    And @originallucifer Ipeople have been complaining about this for years -- it was an issue in 2011 with Diaspora, 2016 with Gnu social, 2017 with Mastodon, etc etc etc -- so it's not a matter of fediverse software as a whole being in its infancy. Even Lemmy's been around for almost four years at this point. It's just that the developers haven't prioritized this.

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • From the article:

    I'm using LGBTQIA2S+ as a shorthand for lesbian, gay, gender non-conforming, genderqueer, bi, trans, queer, intersex, asexual, agender, two-sprit, and others (including non-binary people) who are not straight, cis, and heteronormative. Julia Serrano's trans, gender, sexuality, and activism glossary has definitions for most of terms, and discusses the tensions between ever-growing and always incomplete acronyms and more abstract terms like "gender and sexual minorities". OACAS Library Guides' Two-spirit identities page goes into more detail on this often-overlooked intersectional aspect of non-cis identity.

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • I'll get to that in a followon post, but one straightforward way to make progress is to change some of the defaults

  • Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    Jump

  • As I say in the article:

    Despite these problems, many people on well-moderated instances have very positive experiences in today's fediverse. Especially for small-to-medium-size instances, for experienced moderators even Mastodon's tools can be good enough.

    However, many instances aren't well-moderated. So many people have very negative experiences in today's fediverse.

  • Fediverse @lemmy.world
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    Mastodon and today's fediverse are unsafe by design and unsafe by default

    privacy.thenexus.today /unsafe-by-design-and-unsafe-by-default/
  • Privacy @lemmy.ml
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    Call Congress to Stop KOSA (US focused)

    act.eff.org /action/call-congress-to-stop-kosa
  • Privacy @lemmy.ml
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    FISA: Oversight Board Recommends Reforms to Section 702 to Protect Americans’ Privacy

    www.brennancenter.org /our-work/analysis-opinion/federal-oversight-board-recommends-reforms-section-702-fisa-protect
  • LGBTQ+ @beehaw.org
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    Over 100 Parents of Trans Kids Sign Letter Opposing KOSA (US-focused)

    www.them.us /story/parents-of-trans-kids-letter-kids-online-safety-act
  • Technology @lemmy.world
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    The Protecting Kids on Social Media Act is A Terrible Alternative to KOSA

    www.eff.org /deeplinks/2023/08/protecting-kids-social-media-act-terrible-alternative-kosa
  • Technology @beehaw.org
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    The Internet Is About to Get a Lot Worse (US focused)

    buttondown.email /charliejane/archive/the-internet-is-about-to-get-a-lot-worse/
  • Technology @lemmy.ml
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    The Internet Is About to Get a Lot Worse (US focused)

    buttondown.email /charliejane/archive/the-internet-is-about-to-get-a-lot-worse/
  • United States | News & Politics @lemmy.ml
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    A ham-handed bill attacks the First Amendment in the name of protecting minors from online harm (US)

    reason.com /2023/08/09/a-ham-handed-bill-attacks-the-first-amendment-in-the-name-of-protecting-minors-from-online-harm/
  • politics @lemmy.world
    The Nexus of Privacy @lemmy.sdf.org

    Republicans Are Fooling Democrats on Kids’ Online Safety (US)

    newrepublic.com /article/174786/republicans-fooling-democrats-kids-online-safety