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While we were waiting for Level 2 and the daily COVID updates, the New Zealand Police have been covertly breaching our rights. On the morning of May 13th, Detective Sergeant Tom Fitzgerald announced that the New Zealand Police had carried out a trial of Clearview AI facial recognition software.

While they ultimately concluded that they would not be implementing this technology as the value to investigations has been assessed as very limited the testing of this software raised many concerning issues.

This trial was not approved by the appropriate channels and the software tested was beyond problematic. Alongside the potential privacy breaches the software may have enabled, the programme itself was created by white-supremacists.

A recent investigation of Clearview AI exposed extensive connections between many high ranked employees with anti-Semitic hate groups, white nationalists extremists, and other Alt-Right movements.

Marko Jukic, the man who corresponded with the New Zealand Police about the software, has since left the company after being discovered as the author of excessive hate speech publications.

Despite the publication of Clearviews ties to these radical groups being released in early April, the New Zealand Police were still trialling the software as late as May 11th.

Even if you cant see the problem with the Police, as a representative of the New Zealand government, allying itself with a company composed of white nationalists, there are several other problems with the software. Having people who hold these beliefs involved in the creation of the software likely means that it is not fit for purpose.

While AI itself is a neutral tool, it learns through the data it is fed by its developers. This data, and thus the programme, can be affected by implicit human bias or in this case, explicit hate.

The most famous example of bias in AI was Amazons Rekognition. This facial recognition software was independently tested and matched the identity of 28 members of the United States Congress with convicted criminals. These incorrect matches disproportionately involved people of colour.

Although Clearview AI markets itself as 100% accurate, it has never been independently tested so there is nothing stopping the company claiming this.

The overrepresentation of Mori and Pasifika people in the New Zealand criminal justice sector due to targeted arrests and harsher sentencing is a national disgrace.

Yet the New Zealand Police have illegally trialled a software which could exacerbate this problem through inaccurate matches caused by coded bias. Among many other legal rights, this breaches New Zealand citizens right to be free from discrimination.

Even outside the discriminatory effects of this software, this trial contravenes an untold amount of privacy rights. Facial recognition technologies are most effective when they have a large database of profiles, a catalogue of real peoples identities, which the software compares an image against to find a match.

The larger the database, the more content the AI can test against, and the more accurately it matches profiles. Clearview has 2.8 billion profiles on the database, mostly images illegally lifted from social media sites. It is more than likely many New Zealanders will be on the database.

Not only have the Police allied themselves with white-supremacists by using Clearview, but they are also endorsing illegal data collection practices and prioritising their own investigative powers over citizens privacy rights.

Privacy Commissioner John Edwards responded to news of this testing in a very disappointing manner, saying he was a little surprised by this one. Given the sole role of the Privacy Commissioners Office is privacy protection, youd hope for a bit more than surprise; something like outrage and decisive condemnation of the polices actions maybe?

The Police have displayed an extreme lack of transparency around exactly what the trial entailed, so it is unclear just how many New Zealanders had their privacy rights breached and how these rights were breached.

Because the softwares matching ability would need to be comprehensively tested, I would hazard a guess that many people had their privacy breached over the course of the testing.

New Zealand doesnt have privacy principles written into our constitution like other countries, so we rely on the office of the Privacy Commission to protect our privacy rights and the lack of outrage they have shown is genuinely concerning.

The public deserves greater accountability upon what this trial involved and how it was ever carried out without the appropriate approval. The Polices refusal to respond to Radio New Zealands breaking of this story was especially shameful.

See the original post here:
Facial Recognition Software Designed by Alt-Right Extremists, Covertly Trialed by NZ Police Another Form of Colonial Violence - Salient

Photo courtesy of Megan Thee Stallion.

Karma is savage. After pop music stan Twitter was torn asunder by various nonsenses over the weekend, Billboard revealed that Megan Thee Stallion and Beyonc's remix of "Savage" is now the number one song in the country and sits atop the Hot 100.

It's something of an unexpected event. Upon its release earlier this month, the "Savage" remix was originally locked in a chart battle with the Nicki Minaj-assisted remix of Doja Cat's "Say So." "Savage" originally settled for the number-two slot (making a lot of history along the way), but has proven to be more than just a stat-juicing novelty remix. The "Savage" remix, a complete reimagining of Megan's original track, has shown considerable staying power. It topped the digital sales chart, and was the number two most-streamed song in the country. It's also garnered wide support from radio, and proceeds from the song will benefit families affected by COVID-19 in Beyonc and Megan's joint hometown of Houston, Texas.

Of course, it's hard not to view the song's coronation in light of recent controversies.

Beyonc was name-checked in a now-infamous Instagram post from Baroque pop songstress Lana Del Rey on Friday. "Now that Doja Cat, Ariana, Camila, Cardi B, Kehlani and Nicki Minaj and Beyonc have had number ones with songs about being sexy, wearing no clothes, f**king, cheating etc.can I please go back to singing about being embodied, feeling beautiful by being in love even if the relationship is not perfect, or dancing for money," wrote Del Rey. The oft-flower crown-adorned singer was widely criticized for her framing of the issue, and has spent much of the holiday weekend doubling down on her original post.

(Megan was not mentioned in Del Rey's post. Perhaps because she did not have a number one song at the time, or perhaps because Del Rey heeded Megan's warning in her track "B.I.T.C.H.": "I be quiet, but you out here tellin' stories, one-sided / I ain't perfect and I try to fix the shit that ain't workin' / But it's 2020, I ain't finna argue 'bout twerkin'.")

Meanwhile, Doja Cat has also spent the weekend in damage-control mode after allegations arose that she used to hang in video chats with members of the alt-right, and had recorded a song making light of a racial slur. "I shouldnt have been on some of those chat room sites, but I personally have never been involved in any racist conversations," the rapper and singer wrote in response on Instagram. "Im sorry to everyone I offended."

Megan, meanwhile, passed her time chilling in her backyard with her French Bulldog, Foe thee Frenchie, according to her Instagram.

"This is our first, but it damn sure wont be our last!" Megan has now written on Instagram in response to the chart placement news. "I love yall so much."

Beyonc has now joined Mariah Carey as the only artist to have number one hits as a solo artist in the '00s, '10s, and '20s so far. The song is now Beyonc's seventh number one (not including her work with Destiny's Child).

The "Savage" remix is just the seventh collaboration between two female solo musicians to hit the number one spot in history, and 2020 is now the first year in which two such collaborations reached the peak.

For those playing along at home, Ariana Grande and Lady Gaga's mega-collaboration "Rain on Me" will not be eligible for the charts until next week. It's still early, but by all accounts the song has a strong chance of debuting at number onemeaning 2020's female duet chart history could be far from over.

Related: Five Thoughts On The Rain on Me Music Video

Link:
Beyonc and Megan's "Savage" Hits Number One, Proving Karma Is Real - W Magazine

Ellin Stein considers whether Times Radio could be part of a wider campaign against public service broadcasting in the UK

There is no obvious reason why an announcement that The Times and the Sunday Times were launching a radio station should have raised an alarm. After all, the initial line-up promises such highly-regarded voices as Channel 4 Newss Cathy Newman and John Pienaar, until recently the BBCs respected deputy political editor.

Theres always a chance Times columnists like climate-change denier Nigel Lawson or the performatively politically incorrect Rod Liddle may get a berth, but on the whole Times Radio is positioning itself as a sober alternative to the news and politics aspect of BBC Radio 4.

So why the paranoia?

The announcement last winter came at the height of the governments campaign to demoralize/kill off the BBC, leaking (to the Sunday Times) that the license fee would be scrapped and revving up its army of Twitter trolls to complain bitterly about BBC bias and taxes imposed by unelected bureaucrats.

The concerted attack on the license fee brought to mind an online manifesto written by Dominic Cummings when he was heading up the New Frontiers Foundation. In it, Cummings declared that the Conservative Party needed to realize the BBC was a mortal enemy, that the privileged closed world of the BBC had to be turned upside down, that its very existence should be the subject of a very intense and well-funded campaign.

Cummings went on to say that there were three structural things that the Right needs to happen in terms of communications 1) the undermining of the BBCs credibility; 2) the creation of a Fox News equivalent / talk radio shows / bloggers etc. to shift the centre of gravity; 3) the end of the ban on TV political advertising.

(The ban on political advertising was upheld by the European Court of Human Rights. Though this is not changed by the UK departing the EU, there have been many Conservative voices arguing we should leave the ECHR too. If the ban was overturned it would give, as in the US, a big advantage to any British political party able to amass a huge war chest for such ad buys and enhanced influence for the donors who provide the funds.)

But why should Cummings have cared about radio (admittedly this list was written in 2004 and today he might well have substituted podcast)?

Many British people may be unaware of the pivotal role AM talk radio played in the rise of the Alt-Right in the US and the radicalization of listeners that culminated in the creation of the Trump base.

Starting in 1988, Rush Limbaugh pioneered a new form of talk radio best described as political infotainment. Originally Limbaugh combined slightly right-of-centre Republican politics with a Kenny Everett-like zaniness, but over the years raised the ante and grew more extreme to keep the audience engaged. Competition for the Republican audience became a race to the lunatic fringe, and hosts like Glenn Beck, Laura Ingraham, and Bill OReilly who would go on to be Fox News most visible editorial commentators increasingly peddled a toxic blend of personal slurs, conspiracy theories, and thinly-disguised white nationalism.

There is a long tradition of US radio broadcasters using the airwaves to disseminate such views. In the 1930s, Father Coughlin a Catholic priest who began by espousing social justice, supporting the New Deal, and denouncing the KKK and at his height reached some 30 million listeners over time allowed his hatred of international finance to morph into a hatred of Jews in general (still a well-trodden path, it would seem). His shows stridently promoted an anti-Communist, anti-Semitic, pro-fascist agenda until he was finally taken off the air when war in Europe broke out.

In radios early heyday, AM stations dominated the medium. They were mostly owned by local entrepreneurs and formed a latticework that gave Americans something to listen to as they drove the long empty highways. Programming ranged from mainstream comedy stars like Jack Benny on stations affiliated to one of the big networks to, on small independents, regional music like Country & Western or fire-breathing religious programming, reinforcing the cultural linkage between rural communities, country music, and evangelical preachers that persists to this day.

There were successors to Coughlins virulent anti-leftist tradition on the airwaves during the Cold War but they were balanced out with more mainstream and even progressive voices. But then three factors led to AM Radio becoming dominated by not only conservative but increasingly demagogic right-wing voices.

One force towards extremism was the migration of listeners from AM to the FM band starting in the late 60s.

FM had always been the home of obscure rarified programming, like classical music or Latvian-language broadcasts, but when freeform rock stations started colonising it because of the better fidelity, the giant youth demographic followed, leaving AM with programming that didnt need good sound quality like talk radio and baseball games. As a result, by the 1980s, audience numbers and the price of an AM license had plummeted.

The biggest factor in unleashing the Conservative dominance of talk radio was the Reagan administrations revoking of the Fairness Doctrine in 1987. This regulation had meant that in order to keep their licenses, broadcasters had to devote airtime to issues of public importance while ensuring both sides of the debate were fairly represented. It also gave anyone subject to a personal attack on a program a right to reply. This ensured programs were less incendiary and more tethered to reality.

The final boost to conservative talk radio was the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which lifted restrictions on the number of stations that could be owned by any one company. The result was the relatively cheap AM stations being snapped up by conservative-leaning media corporations such as Clear Channel and, more recently, Sinclair Broadcasting, providing a bully pulpit for Republican candidates while pushing party politics ever further to the right and diminishing whatever party leaders they considered insufficiently zealous, like Mitt Romney.

However, with the rise of internet stations and the inevitable shrinking of its predominately over-50 demographic, the AM stations are once again on the decline.

Times Radio isnt going to be on AM but on DAB and streamed. If Rupert Murdoch really wanted to create a beachhead for right-wing shock jocks, he already has Times Radios stablemate TalkRADIO, which features hosts like Dan Wootton, Julia Hartley-Brewer, and James Whale.

More than likely he just wants to siphon talent and audience from BBC Radio 4, and any resulting loss of BBC influence is an added benefit. Still, when Cummings has an ideological and Murdoch a financial interest in seeing a project succeed, its worth keeping a wary eye on.

Read more from the original source:
Is Murdoch's New Radio Station Part of Dominic Cummings' Onslaught on his 'Mortal Enemy' the BBC? - Byline Times

In every single media interview, TVNZ Breakfast, The AM Show & Q+A, Muller was more self mutilating than a depressed teenager.

How on earth do National strategists think this omnishambles will win back 400 000 voters?

The unbelievable manner in which Muller gets that real time David Shearer brain freeze look on his face as hes desperately trying to work out if his answer lines up with all stake holders makes you wonder how the Christ drowning National MPs thought this straw was the last thing to grasp at.

Remember, this coup was driven by self interest and the fear of unemployment as such it has no real political depth or value other than self preservation.

Muller is upper management class, he barks orders and others follow, he is clearly not used to being challenged, and the most disturbing thing about his terrible media performances to date is that hes actually lost his cool in every single interview, he gets angry at being challenged!

TDB Recommends NewzEngine.com

That privileged temper of his has got to be worked out immediately because if he snaps like that at Jacinda in the debates, National will be lucky to limp home with 20%.

And this isnt just the Left piling on, the hard right voices in NZ media are equally appalled at Mullers bewildering incompetence

AM Show host Mark Richardson lashes out at new National leader Todd Muller: He has failed every time

Mike Hosking: Could Todd Muller have had a worse start?

When Mark Richardson and Mike Hosking are flaying Todd Muller, things have gone very very wrong.

Thats like Trump criticising KFC or Farmers attacking milk or alt-Right Nazis demanding equal pay for women.

Its criticism from a quarter you dont expect and suggests that National will look back on Simons 29% as the halcyon days of gold.

Muller is a train-wreck that crashes into a school bus that starts an explosion in a rest home.

Did Hoots really destroy a career at RNZ and the NZ Herald for this?

NZ can go 5 days without any Coronavirus can Todd Muller go 24hours without any self-mutilation?

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Read the original post:
MEDIA WATCH: When Mark Richardson and Mike Hosking are flaying Todd Muller, things have gone very very wrong - thedailyblog.co.nz

What do far-right blogger Michelle Malkin, conspiracy nuts, and Trumps racist fanboys have in common? Theyre like political herpesno matter what you do, theyre always going to reappear, somewhere.

In Episode 9 of The New Abnormal, The Daily Beasts podcast for a world gone off the rails, Rick Wilson explains why hes avoiding sushi, tea, helicopters, and, perhaps, knives. And Molly Jong-Fast mulls over what is going on in Michelle Malkins mind, and unexpectedly wins an alt-right prize.

Oh, and, of course, they have to talk about the Trump kids creep-tweeting over the weekend.

All this signaling from this weekend [made it] very clear to me that they were trying to reestablish some of that [alt-right] relationship and to reboot some of that love of the green frog army, Rick says.

Then our dynamic duo talk to Daily Beast reporter Olivia Messer about her new story involving Ashton Kutcher, Joe Exotic, and some rather suspect coronavirus tests.

No other country has the same testing problem, Messer explains. Diagnostic kits are available at the White House in 15 minutes and they're still costing Americans more than that. Welp.

Plus! Molly and Rick debut two new features: Breaking Dumb, and Trump Those Fuckbros (or is it the other way around?).

Listen to The New Abnormal on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher.

Excerpt from:
Why Michelle Malkin Is Den Mother of the Alt-Right Dipsh*ts - The Daily Beast