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The complaint from the Federal Trade Commission and the New York Attorney General’s office focused on YouTube’s use of cookies to track viewers of kids’ channels without getting permission from parents. Under COPPA regulations, websites and online services targeting children need to disclose their data collection practices and receive consent from parents.
In addition to the payment — a relatively small sum for YouTube-owner Google — the settlement requires the company to develop a system that allows channel-owners to identify content aimed at children.
The new products include a next-generation Fire TV Cube, a Fire TV Edition soundbar from Anker — its first foray into Fire TV Edition audio products — and 15 other Fire TV Edition products, including the first OLED Fire TV Edition smart TVs.
Porsche has poured more than $1 billion into the development of its first all-electric vehicle.
LOS ANGELES, CA – AUGUST 16: Actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt attends the 2014 Creative Arts Emmy Awards press room held at the Nokia Theatre L.A. Live on August 16, 2014 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Tommaso Boddi/WireImage)
Gordon-Levitt isn’t just the star of movies like “500 Days of Summer” — he’s also the founder of production company HitRecord, which he’s trying to turn into “GitHub for creativity.”
Ginger works with companies and their healthcare providers to provide employees with an app-based way to connect with coaches to talk through their issues and suggest ways forward.
Europeans going online to seek support for these issues are having sensitive health data tracked and passed to third parties, according to Privacy International’s findings.
The company has run two successful crowdfunding campaigns for a pair of minimalist phones designed to augment or replace the smartphone. Today the startup announced that it will be shipping its second version of the handset. (Extra Crunch membership required.)
While investors are already writing big checks for meditation startups, Elevate Labs founder and CEO Jesse Pickard said that none of the existing meditation apps can replace the experience of working with a human coach.
“This experience where you have somebody that meets with you is wildly better than any digital product that’s out there,” Pickard said. “The problem is, it’s not affordable to 99% of the planet.”
So Elevate Labs is launching a new mobile app today called Balance, which is designed to replicate the experience of working with a live meditation coach.
“Even with meditation increasingly getting into the mainstream, it’s a fairly difficult practice to adhere to,” Pickard said. “We take away a lot of that indecision and present you with a path that is unique to you … People live all sorts of different lives: Some people care about stress, some people care about sleep, some people care about focus. But when you and I go into any of the other major apps , we’re getting the exact same recording.”
With Balance, on the other hand, you’re not just browsing through a library of prerecorded content. Instead, the app starts out by asking you about your goals, your meditation experience and more. You’ll then get a set of introductory meditations that may look familiar, but Pickard said that each meditation is actually “a combination of dozens and dozens of clips woven together that’s personalized to you.”
For example, I told the app that I already had experience with meditation, and that my top goal was to stay focused. As a result, my first meditation skipped most of the introductory explanations, and the main exercise was designed to help me focus on the sound of my breath.
Pickard said the app will continue to ask you questions about your experience over time, which in turn will lead to more personalization. The meditations are narrated by coach Leah Santa Cruz, who’s also involved in writing the content, and there are other meditation experts on the Balance team.
The app’s initial 10-day meditation course is free. After that, to get access to additional meditations you’ll need to pay $11.99 per month, $49.99 per year or $199.99 for a lifetime subscription. In addition to the meditations, Balance also includes a guided activity designed to help people sleep.
On top of launching a new app, Elevate Labs is also announcing that it’s raised a $7.1 million Series B led by Keesing Media Group, with participation from Oakhouse Partners.
Under its old name MindSnacks, the company built language-learning games before shifting focus to Elevate, a “brain training” app that has supposedly been downloaded 25 million times and won Apple’s App of the Year Award in 2014. Pickard (who, thanks to the magic of Craigslist, was my roommate for about a year when I was first starting at TechCrunch) said that unlike most of the other apps that are marketed as improving your mind, Elevate focuses on trainable skills like reading, writing and math — rather than, say, improving your memory.
“We’ve been extremely careful about [not] venturing into untrainable skills — things like improving your attention span, those activities are not as provenly teachable,” he said.
It’s been a while since the company has raised outside funding — seven years since MindSnacks announced a Series A from Sequoia. Pickard said the company actually raised another bridge round in 2015, then “buckled down for a number of years and really just had to build a business that actually was sustainable.”
Apparently that’s paid off — he said Elevate Labs was cashflow positive last year. With a total of $17.1 million in funding, the plan now is to continue supporting and growing Elevate while also launching Balance and building a whole line of related apps.
“We think there’s a really huge brand to be built around mental fitness,” Pickard said.
Posted by Rajan Patel, Director, Augmented Reality
Around the world, millions of people are coming online for the first time, and many of them are among the 800 million adults worldwide who are unable to read or write, or those who are migrating to towns and cities where they are not able to speak the predominant language. As a smartphone camera-based tool, Google Lens has great potential for helping people who struggle with reading and other language-based challenges. Lens uses computer vision, machine learning and Google’s Knowledge Graph to let people turn the things they see in the real world into a visual search box, enabling them to identify objects like plants and animals, or to copy and paste text from the real world into their phone.
However, in order for Lens to be able to help the greatest number of people, we needed to create a special version that can work on even the most basic smartphones. So at I/O 2019, we announced a new version of Lens designed specifically for use in Google Go—our Search app for entry level devices—and we included a new set of features designed to help people who face reading and other language-based challenges. When users point their camera at text they don’t understand, Lens in Google Go can translate and read it out loud. It even highlights each word as it’s being read so users can follow along. If you want to try out these features for yourself, they are available today via Lens in Google Go. While Google Go was initially available only on Android Go devices and on the Google Play Store in select markets, recently, we made it available globally in the Google Play Store.
To make these reading features work, the Google Go version of Lens needs to be able to capture high quality images on a wide variety of devices, then identify the text, understand its structure, translate and overlay it in context, and finally, read it out loud.
Image Capture
Image capture on entry-level devices, like those that run Android Go, is tricky since it must work on a wide variety of devices, many of which are more resource constrained than flagship phones. To build a universal tool that can reliably capture high-quality images with minimal lag, we made Lens in Google Go an early adopter of a new Android support library called CameraX. Available in Jetpack—a suite of libraries, tools, and guidance for Android developers—CameraX is an abstraction layer over the Android Camera2 API that resolves device compatibility issues so developers don't have to write their own device-specific code.
Using CameraX, we implemented two capture strategies to balance capture latency against performance impact. On higher-end phones, which are powerful enough to provide a constant stream of high-resolution frames from which to select an image, we’ve made capture instantaneous. On less advanced devices, streaming these frames could cause camera lag since the CPU is less powerful, so we process the frame when the user taps capture to produce a single, on-demand high-resolution image.
Text Recognition
After Lens in Google Go captures an image, it needs to make sense of the shapes and letters that constitute the words, sentences and paragraphs. To do this, the image is scaled down and transferred to the Lens server, where the processing will be performed. Next, optical character recognition (OCR) is applied, which utilizes a region proposal network to detect character level bounding boxes that can be merged into lines for text recognition.
Merging these character boxes into words is a two-step, sequential process. The first step is to apply the Hough Transform, which assumes the text is distributed across parallel lines. The second step uses Text Flow, which instead traces text that may follow a curve by finding the shortest path through a graph of detected text boxes. This ensures that text with a variety of distributions, be they straight, curved or mixed, can be identified and processed.
Because the images captured by Lens in Google Go may include sources such as signage, handwriting or documents, a slew of additional challenges can arise. For example, the text can be obscured, scripts can be uniquely stylized, and images can be blurry. All of these issues can cause the OCR engine to misunderstand various characters within each word. To correct mistakes and improve word accuracy, Lens in Google Go uses the context of surrounding words to make corrections. It also utilizes the Knowledge Graph to provide contextual clues, such as whether a word is likely a proper noun and should not be spell-corrected.
All of these steps, from script detection and direction identification to text recognition, are performed by separable convolutional neural networks (CNNs) with an additional quantized long short-term memory (LSTM) network. And the models are trained on data from a variety of sources, ranging from ReCaptcha to scanned images from Google Books.
Left: Image with bounding box around recognized text. The raw OCR output from this image reads, “Cise is beauti640”. Right: By applying Knowledge Graph in addition to context from nearby words, Lens in Google Go recognizes the words, “life is beautiful”.
Understanding Structure
Once the individual words have been recognized, Lens must determine how to fit them together. The text that people come across in the real world is laid out in many different ways. A newspaper, for example, is laid out into columns, with headlines, article text, and advertisements. Meanwhile, a bus schedule, has one column for destinations and another with times. While understanding text structure comes very naturally to people, computers need to be taught how to comprehend it. Lens uses CNNs to detect coherent text blocks like columns, or text in a consistent style or color. And then, within each block, it uses signals like text-alignment, language, and the geometric relationship of the paragraphs to determine their final reading order.
One of the other challenges in detecting document structure is that people take pictures of text from different angles, often with a warped perspective. This means we cannot revert to off-the-shelf detectors that rely on axis aligned boxes, but must generalize our systems to be able to deal with homographic distortions.
Paragraph segmentation on the front page of a newspaper. Notice how “News Analysis”, which is embedded in the middle of a column, has been identified separately due to its distinct style features.
Translations in Context
To provide users with the most helpful information, translations must be both accurate and contextual. Lens uses Google Translate’s neural machine translation (NMT) algorithms, to translate entire sentences at a time, rather than going word-by-word, in order to preserve proper grammar and diction.
For the translation to be most useful, it needs to be placed in the context of the original text. For example, when translating instructions on an ATM, it is important to know which buttons correspond to which instructions. Part of the challenge is accounting for the fact that the translated text can be much shorter or longer than the original. For example, German sentences tend to be longer than English ones. To accomplish this seamless overlay, Lens redistributes the translation into lines of similar length, and chooses an appropriate font size to match. It also matches the color of the translation and its background with the original text through the use of a heuristic that assumes the background and the text differ in luminosity, and that the background takes up the majority of the space. This allows Lens to classify whether a pixel represents background or text, and then sample the average color from these two regions to ensure the translated text matches the original text.
Reading the Text Out Loud
The final challenge in delivering information in the most helpful way with Lens in Google Go is reading the text aloud. High-fidelity audio is generated using Google Text-to-Speech (TTS), a service that applies machine learning to disambiguate and detected entities such as dates, phone numbers and addresses, and uses that to generate realistic speech based on DeepMind’s WaveNet.
These reading features become more contextual and useful when they are paired with display. Lens utilizes timing annotations from the TTS service that mark the beginning of each word in order to highlight each word on screen as it’s being read, similar to a karaoke machine. Say for example, a user takes a picture of an ATM screen with different labels next to different buttons. This karaoke effect allows users to know which label applies to which button. It may also help users learn how to pronounce the words being translated. Looking Ahead
Taken together, it is our hope that these features will have a positive impact on the day-to-day lives of millions of people. Moving forward, we will continue to work on further updates to these reading features to make the OCR more precise, including improvements to text structure understanding (e.g. multi-column text) and recognition of Indic scripts. As we address these text challenges, we continue to look for new ways that the combination of machine learning and the smartphone camera can help people as they go about their lives.
All eyes are on the next iPhone, but Apple could also be working on a new Apple TV. The device could be announced next week, or maybe later this fall.
The anonymous Twitter account @never_released shared the codename of a new Apple TV — AppleTV11,1 or J305AP. They have been accurate when it comes to finding codenames of various unreleased Apple products in the past.
MacRumors has separately found a reference to AppleTV11,1 in an internal build of the upcoming major iOS release, iOS 13. @never_released adds that the new Apple TV could feature an A12 Bionic system on a chip.
The current Apple TV 4K runs on an A10X Fusion system on a chip. That chip was originally designed for the 10.5-inch and 12.9-inch iPad Pro that was released in 2017.
A spec bump would make a lot of sense as Apple is about to launch Apple Arcade, its gaming subscription service that works on iOS, macOS and tvOS. For a flat monthly fee, you’ll be able to play games on your iPhone and seamlessly switch to a Mac or an Apple TV.
It’s unclear whether the next Apple TV will have more important changes. For instance, Apple could use this opportunity to update the remote.
Many have also been asking for a more affordable Apple TV device. As Apple is about to launch Apple TV+, its subscription streaming service with original content, the company will likely try to make the service available to as many people as possible. But the A12-powered device looks like an update to the Apple TV 4K.
Logitech has delivered a new version of its popular MX Master mouse – the MX Master 3. This brand new iteration of the wireless mouse finally adds USB-C charging, which brings it in line with the charging standards used on most modern smartphones and computer accessories. Along with the MX Master 3, Logitech also debuted its new MX Keys wireless keyboard, which gives you a lot of what’s great about their fantastic Logitech Craft keyboard in a more affordable, slightly trimmed down package.
The MX Master 3 mouse isn’t just about adding USB-C (although that alone might be reason enough for me to upgrade, personally). It also packs new scroll wheel technology that is 90 percent faster, 8 percent more precise, and almost entirely silent, according to Logitech.
Along with its improvements, it comes with the same highly accurate 4,000 DPI tracking sensor, which uses Logitech’s ‘Darkfield’ technology that optimizes tracking on virtually every surface. The built-in battery is good for as many as 70 days on a full charge, and via the new USB-C quick charging, you’ll get a full day of use in just three minutes of charging.
The body is slightly redesigned on this mouse, too, but only slightly so it’s probably going to feel just as comfortable if you’re a fan of the existing Master series. The MX Master 3 retails for $99.99 and is on sale now via Logitech directly and Amazon.
The MX Keys keyboard, which is also on sale now with a retail price of $99.99. It has illuminated keys, with automatic hand detection, which you can turn off if you want for longer battery life. You an also get an optional add-on detachable palm rest for more ergonomic typing. This looks like a really promising piece of hardware based on the reputation of the excellent Logitech Craft, but a much better bargain.
Electric bike maker Cowboy has recruited a well-known name when it comes to mobile app design. Jeremy Le Van co-founded Sunrise, a well-designed calendar app that was acquired by Microsoft back in 2015. Le Van will become VP of Product and lead the development of Cowboy’s mobile app.
Following Sunrise’s acquisition, Le Van has worked for Microsoft for a handful of years. Sunrise has been the foundation for the calendar feature of the Outlook mobile app.
“I am incredibly excited to join the Cowboy team and bring my insights into how we can transform the smart bicycle market to make it more appealing to the mobile-first generation,” he said in a statement.
Of course, Cowboy is a hardware company as it designs and sells an e-bike. The company wants to make e-bikes more efficient. It features an automatic transmission — motor assistance kicks in automatically when you need it the most, such as when you start pedaling, you accelerate or you go uphill.
Cowboy bikes also feature integrated lights with a rear light that flashes when you break, a rubber and glass fiber belt and a removable battery. Like VanMoof bikes, it has built-in GPS tracking and an integrated SIM card — you unlock the bike with your phone.
But the mobile app is also an essential part of the experience. You can configure the lights, check the battery and get stats from the app. Let’s see how it evolves with today’s appointment.
Cowboy is currently available in Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Austria. The startup has raised a €10 million Series A founding round from Tiger Global, Index Ventures, Hardware Club and others.
Electric bike maker Cowboy has recruited a well-known name when it comes to mobile app design. Jeremy Le Van co-founded Sunrise, a well-designed calendar app that was acquired by Microsoft back in 2015. Le Van will become VP of Product and lead the development of Cowboy’s mobile app.
Following Sunrise’s acquisition, Le Van has worked for Microsoft for a handful of years. Sunrise has been the foundation for the calendar feature of the Outlook mobile app.
“I am incredibly excited to join the Cowboy team and bring my insights into how we can transform the smart bicycle market to make it more appealing to the mobile-first generation,” he said in a statement.
Of course, Cowboy is a hardware company as it designs and sells an e-bike. The company wants to make e-bikes more efficient. It features an automatic transmission — motor assistance kicks in automatically when you need it the most, such as when you start pedaling, you accelerate or you go uphill.
Cowboy bikes also feature integrated lights with a rear light that flashes when you break, a rubber and glass fiber belt and a removable battery. Like VanMoof bikes, it has built-in GPS tracking and an integrated SIM card — you unlock the bike with your phone.
But the mobile app is also an essential part of the experience. You can configure the lights, check the battery and get stats from the app. Let’s see how it evolves with today’s appointment.
Cowboy is currently available in Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Austria. The startup has raised a €10 million Series A founding round from Tiger Global, Index Ventures, Hardware Club and others.
How to teach teenagers to think critically about porn | Emily F. Rothman
"The free, online, mainstream pornography that teenagers are most likely to see is a completely terrible form of sex education," says public health researcher Emily F. Rothman. She shares how her mission to end dating and sexual violence led her to create a pornography literacy program that helps teens learn about consent and respect -- and invites them to think critically about sexually explicit media.
We depend on Google for looking up facts and information on any topic. But since Google doesn’t verify every link, it’s not always wise to trust the data it gives you.
Google’s algorithms like PageRank have got better at assessing expertise and trustworthiness of a website. But the wrong information can sneak in or we as readers can make mistakes in interpreting the search results.
Some topics need expert eyes. And that’s why it is always better to tread with caution while exploring these six sensitive subjects.
1. Medical Information
We don’t have to live in a state of uncertainty when we’re not feeling well. Google allows us to instantly diagnose our symptoms. However, there’s a reason behind the “Don’t trust Google” signs at your doctor’s clinic.
Medical sites don’t have access to your records. Therefore, they end up suggesting all the possible causes and treatments for a symptom—not specific to your case.
So while fever is technically one of the symptoms of cancer, it doesn’t mean you have it. You are most likely suffering from just a common cold.
Hence, you should undergo a proper checkup and consult a real doctor before reaching a conclusion.
2. Financial Advice
Taking care of your finances can be a demanding process. But Google is the last place from which you should seek advice.
Google’s treasure trove of data is, at best, a supplementary resource for your financial research. On a search engine, you’ll come across a range of opinions and articles which might mislead or cloud your judgment. A straightforward query on a particular investment will surface a myriad of links and it will be difficult to gauge which one offers sound guidance.
Hence, you should stick to more credible financial research platforms and not a search engine like Google to base your ultimate decisions and understand market trends.
3. Conspiracy Theories
Another topic you should stay clear of on Google is conspiracy theories. Controversial arguments tend to drive the most traffic online. Some websites exploit this by talking about theories that would fetch more clicks and stimulate conversations.
Google is home to the internet’s wildest stories which often rank high just because they’re popular. Even for folklore as absurd as the Bigfoot, you will find enough evidence to convince someone (or just yourself). And that’s just within the first few pages… you don’t need to go down the rabbit hole.
For instance, searching for “bigfoot real” on Google will easily lead you to numerous compilations of supposedly real photos of Bigfoot sightings.
4. Breaking News
Misinformation runs rampant on the web and like other online platforms, Google too has struggled to get a grip on the spread of fake news. The issue’s effects magnify during a breaking news event. In such scenarios, the details are scant, which gives rise to hoaxes and rumors.
While Google has safety measures in place for tackling misinformation, they often don’t kick in immediately. By the time Google takes a false news piece down, there’s a good chance it has been read by millions.
Google offers an abundance of resources for people looking to be more religiously informed. However, it’s also in a constant battle with racial bias and discrimination. While researching, you will encounter sites that favor certain religions. It’s difficult to judge the veracity of these web pages when you’re new to the subject.
In her book titled “Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism”, Safiya Umoja Noble argues that search engines like Google are not “trusted, credible public information portals” and says they’re discriminatory and favor the groups that designed or funded them.
This monopoly of information is a threat to democracy…
Since Google’s algorithms are influenced by what the majority of its users are searching, minorities end up being misrepresented.
6. Chemical-Related Queries
When you’re dealing with chemicals, even a minor error can prove fatal. Therefore, if there’s a chemical-related detail you aren’t sure about, turning to Google’s search engine might not be the best way forward. Google is known to host a range of contradictory data and deciding which one to trust can be a challenge.
Like medical platforms, chemical sites don’t have access to your circumstances and environmental properties like the room’s ambient temperature.
This applies to the use of chemicals in scenarios outside of the lab too. For instance, the debate concerning whether the presence of Chlorine in swimming pools has an adverse on your health has divided the internet for ages.
As an alternative to Google, you can check out the official websites of chemistry boards and associations.
Yes, Don’t Trust Wikipedia Facts Either
One of the biggest misconceptions about the internet is that the information on Wikipedia is always vetted and accurate. That’s far from the truth. Most of Wikipedia’s content is crowd-sourced and can be edited by anyone.
Contrary to popular belief, the site doesn’t have a team of human curators who fact-check everything.
Google processes thousands of queries each second and is one of the internet’s best inventions. But its search engine algorithms have also allowed misleading websites to flourish. While there are a handful of other topics you shouldn’t depend on Google for, the ones we discussed here top that list.
Back for a new run of episodes, this week’s Really Useful Podcast is a “back to school” special, with tips for students looking for new laptops, computer chairs, and useful apps and websites.
Really Useful Podcast Season 4 Episode 1 Shownotes
Spotify’s newest paid subscription, the Premium Duo plan designed for two people, first launched this spring as a pilot test in Ireland, Colombia, Chile, Denmark, and Poland. Today, Spotify says the plan is being more broadly rolled out to 14 more Latin American markets.
The new markets include: Argentina, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, and Uruguay.
The Duo plan is meant mainly for couples, though it could apply to roommates or any other two people who share the same home address.
In terms of pricing, it’s a step up from a single Premium subscription but more affordable than a Family Plan, as it’s limited to just two accounts. However, the Duo plan is discounted so it’s a better deal than buying two separate Premium accounts.
The benefits are similar to those on the Family Plan. Like the larger group plan, Duo keeps each user’s music preferences and recommendations separate from one another. And like the Family Plan, which recently added a custom mix composed of track everyone in the family enjoys, the Duo subscription also includes its own shared playlist, the Duo Mix. Members can easily share their playlist libraries with one another, too.
Despite now reaching 19 total markets, Spotify still refers to the Premium Duo plan as a “pilot,” which typically means the company hasn’t fully committed to bringing the service to all its users at some point. Instead, that terminology typically implies the company is continuing to evaluate the new service’s impact.
In Spotify’s case, Premium Duo’s launch in March hasn’t yet led to a massive subscription bump. When reporting its Q2 2019 earnings, the company said it added 8 million new subscribers in the quarter, which was below the estimated 8.5 million figure. It now has 232 million monthly users and 108 million paying subscribers.
That said, Duo hasn’t reached many of Spotify’s key markets where such a plan could have more of an impact to subscriber counts, including the U.S.
If you live in a supported market and already have a Premium plan you can visit your Account page on Spotify’s website to add a partner and upgrade. Both plan members will need to share the same home address.
For a seemingly tough pitch, Light has had little trouble getting noticed. The company has run two successful crowdfunding campaigns for a pair of minimalist phones designed to augment or replace the smartphone. Today the startup announced that it will be shipping the second version of the handset, which introduces a handful of features back into the product, like texting.
Ahead of the launch, we spoke to Light’s founders, Kaiwei Tang and Joe Hollier, about funding, feature glut and the future of the handset.
How it all began
Brian Heater: The project essentially started as an in-house at Google, is that correct?
Kaiwei Tang: We met in 2014 in Google’s incubator called 30 Weeks. That’s where we met and started talking about Light Phone eventually.
Joe Hollier: 30 Weeks program was an experiment that came out of the Google creative lab, and their hypothesis was that if given the right resources, guidance, designers might be able to create new creative startups, and that designers should be on the founding table of companies.
So their hypothesis was that we as designers would be able to imagine a new going to startup in the software application space, and then through designing the end product, which is how the Google creative lab works, we’d be able to inspire the engineers and make the funding investors that we would need to make the product a reality.
Brian: What did you see in the market that wasn’t being fulfilled by countless different smartphone companies?
Joe: People were feeling overwhelmed by their smartphone and craving some escape, and we didn’t really see an escape.
Research by a privacy rights advocacy group has found popular mental health websites in the EU are sharing users’ sensitive personal data with advertisers.
Europeans going online to seek support with mental health issues are having sensitive health data tracked and passed to third parties, according to Privacy International’s findings — including depression websites passing answers and results of mental health check tests direct to third parties for ad targeting purposes.
The charity used the open source Webxray tool to analyze the data gathering habits of 136 popular mental health web pages in France, Germany and the UK, as well as looking at a small sub-set of online depression tests (the top three Google search results for the phrase per country).
“Our findings show that many mental health websites don’t take the privacy of their visitors as seriously as they should,” Privacy International writes. “This research also shows that some mental health websites treat the personal data of their visitors as a commodity, while failing to meet their obligations under European data protection and privacy laws.”
Under Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), there are strict rules governing the processing of health data — which is classified as special category personal data.
If consent is being used as the legal basis to gather this type of data the standard that must be obtained from the user is “explicit” consent.
In practice that might mean a pop-up before you take a depression test which asks whether you’d like to share your mental health with a laundry list of advertisers so they can use it to sell you stuff when you’re feeling low — also offering a clear ‘hell no’ penalty-free choice not to consent (but still get to take the test).
Safe to say, such unvarnished consent screens are as rare as hen’s teeth on the modern Internet.
But, in Europe, beefed up privacy laws are now being used to challenge the ‘data industrial complex’s systemic abuses and help individuals enforce their rights against a behavior-tracking adtech industry that regulators have warned is out of control.
Among Privacy International’s key findings are that —
76.04% of the mental health web pages contained third-party trackers for marketing purposes
Google trackers are almost impossible to avoid, with 87.8% of the web pages in France having a Google tracker, 84.09% in Germany and 92.16% in the UK
Facebook is the second most common third-party tracker after Google, with 48.78% of all French web pages analysed sharing data with Facebook; 22.73% for Germany; and 49.02 % for the UK.
Amazon Marketing Services were also usedby many of the mental health web pages analysed (24.39% of analyzed web pages in France; 13.64 % in Germany; and 11.76% in the UK)
Depression-related web pages used a large number of third-party tracking cookies which were placed before users were able to express (or deny) consent. On average, PI found the mental health web pages placed 44.49 cookies in France; 7.82 for Germany; and 12.24 for the UK
European law around consent as a legal basis for processing (general) personal data — including for dropping tracking cookies — requires it to be informed, specific and freely given. This means websites that wish to gather user data must clearly state what data they intend to collect for what purpose, and do so before doing it, providing visitors with a free choice to accept or decline the tracking.
Dropping tracking cookies without even asking clearly falls foul of that legal standard. And very far foul when you consider the personal data being handled by these mental health websites is highly sensitive special category health data.
“It is exceedingly difficult for people to seek mental health information and for example take a depression test without countless of third parties watching,” said Privacy International technologist Eliot Bendinelli in a statement. “All website providers have a responsibility to protect the privacy of their users and comply with existing laws, but this is particularly the case for websites that share unusually granular or sensitive data with third parties. Such is the case for mental health websites.”
Additionally, the group’s analysis found some of the trackers embedded on mental health websites are used to enable a programmatic advertising practice known as Real Time Bidding (RTB).
These complaints argue that the systematic, high velocity trading of personal data is, by nature, inherently insecure — with no way for people’s information to be secured after it’s shared with hundreds or even thousands of entities involved in the programmatic chain, because there’s no way to control it once it’s been passed. And, therefore, that RTB fails to comply with the GDPR’s requirement that personal data be processed securely.
Complaints are being considered by regulators across multiple Member States. But this summer the UK’s data watchdog, the ICO, essentially signalled it is in agreement with the crux of the argument — putting the adtech industry on watch in an update report in which it warns that behavioral advertising is out of control and instructs the industry it must reform.
However the regulator also said it would give players “an appropriate period of time to adjust their practices”, rather than wade in with a decision and banhammers to enforce the law now.
The ICO’s decision to opt for an implied threat of future enforcement to push for reform of non-compliant adtech practices, rather than taking immediate action to end privacy breaches, drew criticism from privacy campaigners.
And it does look problematic now, given Privacy International’s findings suggest sensitive mental health data is being sucked up into bid requests and put about at insecure scale — where it could pose a serious risk to individuals’ rights and freedoms.
Privacy International says it found “numerous” mental health websites including trackers from known data brokers and AdTech companies — some of which engage in programmatic advertising. It also found some depression test websites (namely: netdoktor.de, passeportsante.net and doctissimo.fr, out of those it looked at) are using programmatic advertising with RTB.
“The findings of this study are part of a broader, much more systemic problem: The ways in which companies exploit people’s data to target ads with ever more precision is fundamentally broken,” adds Bendinelli. “We’re hopeful that the UK regulator is currently probing the AdTech industry and the many ways it uses special category data in ways that are neither transparent nor fair and often lack a clear legal basis.”
We’ve reached out to the ICO with questions.
We also asked the Internet Advertising Bureau Europe what steps it is taking to encourage reform of RTB to bring the system into compliance with EU privacy law. At the time of writing the industry association had not responded.
The IAB recently released a new version of what it refers to as a “transparency and consent management framework” intended for websites to embed to collect consent from visitors to processing their data including for ad targeting purposes — legally, the IAB contends.
However critics argue this is just another dose of business as usual ‘compliance theatre’ from the adtech industry — with users offered only phoney choices as there’s no real control over how their personal data gets used or where it ends up.
IAB consent #IABTCF (v1+v2) presents users and publishers with phoney choices about who receives data from them, but without the technical measures necessary to enforce their choices.
The #GDPR demands "protection against unauthorised or unlawful processing" in Article 5(1)f.
Earlier this year Google’s lead privacy regulator in Europe, the Irish DPC, opened a formal investigation into the company’s processing of personal data in the context of its online Ad Exchange — also as a result of a RTB complaint filed in Ireland.
The DPC said it will look at each stage of an ad transaction to establish whether the ad exchange is processing personal data in compliance with GDPR — including looking at the lawful basis for processing; the principles of transparency and data minimisation; and its data retention practices.
The outcome of that investigation remains to be seen. (Fresh fuel has just today been poured on with the complainant submitting new evidence of their personal data being shared in a way they allege infringes the GDPR.)
Increased regulatory attention on adtech practices is certainly highlighting plenty of legally questionable and ethically dubious stuff — like embedded tracking infrastructure that’s taking liberal notes on people’s mental health condition for ad targeting purposes. And it’s clear that EU regulators have a lot more work to do to deliver on the promise of GDPR.
For a seemingly tough pitch, Light has had little trouble getting noticed. The company has run two successful crowdfunding campaigns for a pair of minimalist phones designed to augment or replace the smartphone. Today the startup announced that it will be shipping the second version of the handset, which introduces a handful of features back into the product, like texting.
Ahead of the launch, we spoke to Light’s founders, Kaiwei Tang and Joe Hollier, about funding, feature glut and the future of the handset.
How it all began
Brian Heater: The project essentially started as an in-house at Google, is that correct?
Kaiwei Tang: We met in 2014 in Google’s incubator called 30 Weeks. That’s where we met and started talking about Light Phone eventually.
Joe Hollier: 30 Weeks program was an experiment that came out of the Google creative lab, and their hypothesis was that if given the right resources, guidance, designers might be able to create new creative startups, and that designers should be on the founding table of companies.
So their hypothesis was that we as designers would be able to imagine a new going to startup in the software application space, and then through designing the end product, which is how the Google creative lab works, we’d be able to inspire the engineers and make the funding investors that we would need to make the product a reality.
Brian: What did you see in the market that wasn’t being fulfilled by countless different smartphone companies?
Joe: People were feeling overwhelmed by their smartphone and craving some escape, and we didn’t really see an escape.
For a seemingly tough pitch, Light has had little trouble getting noticed. The company has run two successful crowdfunding campaigns for a pair of minimalist phones designed to augment or replace the smartphone. Today the startup announced that it will be shipping the second version of the handset, which introduces a handful of features back into the product, like texting.
Ahead of the launch, we spoke to Light’s founders, Kaiwei Tang and Joe Hollier, about funding, feature glut and the future of the handset.
How it all began
Brian Heater: The project essentially started as an in-house at Google, is that correct?
Kaiwei Tang: We met in 2014 in Google’s incubator called 30 Weeks. That’s where we met and started talking about Light Phone eventually.
Joe Hollier: 30 Weeks program was an experiment that came out of the Google creative lab, and their hypothesis was that if given the right resources, guidance, designers might be able to create new creative startups, and that designers should be on the founding table of companies.
So their hypothesis was that we as designers would be able to imagine a new going to startup in the software application space, and then through designing the end product, which is how the Google creative lab works, we’d be able to inspire the engineers and make the funding investors that we would need to make the product a reality.
Brian: What did you see in the market that wasn’t being fulfilled by countless different smartphone companies?
Joe: People were feeling overwhelmed by their smartphone and craving some escape, and we didn’t really see an escape.
There’s that pesky catch-22 you’ve got to get out of the way when discussing the Light Phone and its successor. There’s an inherent irony to a piece of technology created with the express purpose of weaning us off technology. But it’s 2019, and inherent irony is kind of the name of the game.
Light certainly has its share of supporters. As the company announces that it has both begun shipping the Light Phone II to Indiegogo backers and made the product more directly available through its site at $350 (via pre-order), it’s also revealing its funding for the first time. As of this writing, the company has raised $12.3 million.
The crowdfunding parts we knew about, of course. The original phone raised a solid $400,000 on Kickstarter. The Indiegogo campaign for the second version blew that out of the water at $3.5 million with an emphasis on pre-orders. Turns out VCs are getting in on the action, as well, with $8.4 million raised in seed. Hinge Capital, Bullish, White Bay Group, Able Partners, Product Co-Op and HAX have all chipped in, but the leader is the most interesting of the bunch.
Foxconn is the biggest investor of the bunch. The manufacturing giant, naturally, is also helping the company build the handsets and scale things as Light looks toward retail channels beyond its current online offering.
“They’ve been building smart phones for 20, 30 years,” co-founder Kaiwei Tang told TechCrunch. “When we came to them with the first Light Phone, it was just a simplified, voice-only device. Right after the pitch, I was talking to the sales VP who said, ‘hey Kai, I need Light Phone right now. Smartphone has ruined my life. My kids don’t talk to me.’ ”
A number of other high-profile angel investors were equally taken with the notion of a simplified device that could deliver core functionality while weaning users off of smartphone dependence. John Zimmer (Lyft), Michael Mignano and Nir Zicherman (Anchor), Tim Kendall (Moment) and Scott Belsky (Adobe) have all invested, as well.
Like the original Light Phone, the new version presents a sort of built-in paradox for its creators. If the underlying idea is stripping non-core functionality, isn’t introducing a second version with new features somewhat counter-productive?
The new model will get ridesharing (partner to be announced), music playback (likely via on-board storage for starters), turn-by-turn direction and find my phone features. Among other things, the functionality of those features will be limited by the E Ink display. The phone also finds the company making the jump from 2G to LTE. Users can pop in a SIM from AT&T, Verizon or T-Mobile.
“To use an analogy, we’re offering a beautifully designed screwdriver that does one thing well,” says Tang. “Obviously, the Light Phone being an E Ink screen and small size limits it to the users. We don’t encourage people to play videos, or watch video on it. But making a phone call, getting a taxi, listening to music (yes, there’s a headphone jack), recording a voice memo. Maybe down the road they have a calendar reminder, those are the simple tools; it has a clear goal.”
The Light Phone II is probably the least pretty device I’ve reviewed for this site. It’s small, but chunky, like a shrunken e-reader with a screen too small to actually use for e-books. It’s got just enough functionality to (hopefully) free you of your smartphone for hours at a time.
Light says it has sold “tens of thousands” of units. It shipped 15,000 of the first generation and somehow has in the neighborhood of 40,000 reservations it hasn’t filled for the device. The company is looking to push those users toward the Light Phone 2. That device, meanwhile, has around 10,000 pre-orders at present.
Depop started as a simple app to post photos of clothes and post them for sale. But it has become a cultural phenomenon with millions of users, a vibrant community and even some superusers making a living from the platform. That’s why I’m excited to announce that Depop CEO Maria Raga is joining us at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin.
Many have tried to merge a social app with a shopping experience, but few have succeeded. Depop is one of them. If you’re an Instagram user, the app looks familiar with its outline icons. But instead of following brands and sometimes buying new items, Depop is all about vintage items, rare sneakers and things you simply can’t find on a regular social network.
Depop users can follow other users, discover items from their favorite brand, get personalized recommendations, and of course buy and sell items. It’s a social experience that works particularly well on mobile and makes shopping more personal.
Selling something on Depop is as easy as posting photos on a social app. You enter a description, a location, a brand and a price and you’re good to go. After that, other users can buy stuff directly from the app. You can then ship your items and get your money on your PayPal account.
And it’s been a massive success. There are currently over 13 million users — the vast majority of them are under the age of 26. The company has handled more than $500 million of gross merchandise value since its launch.
Interestingly, some superusers thrived on the platform. Those users are talented when it comes to spotting and acquiring limited-edition clothes, sneaker drops and other valuable items. They sell them on Depop with some of them generating as much as $100,000 of revenue per year.
Under Maria Raga, Depop has raised over $100 million. Earlier this summer, the company announced a $62 million funding round led by General Atlantic. It’s clear that Depop is now thriving as both a social app and a marketplace. And I can’t wait to hear how Maria Raga did it.
In addition to panels and fireside chats, like this one, new startups will participate in the Startup Battlefield to compete for the highly coveted Battlefield Cup.
Maria Raga is the CEO of Depop. Since being promoted to the position in 2016 from VP of Operations, she has presided over every element of the business from finance and engineering to marketing and product. An open and collaborative CEO, Maria is dedicated to her team, which has grown to 150+ employees in 5 offices worldwide in the last three years alone. Perhaps most importantly, since she took over as CEO, she has raised close to $100M in funding, which has helped to grow and nurture the community on Depop – now 13 million users.
Prior to Depop, Maria held successively roles at Groupon and Privalia. Having graduated from Insead MBA, Maria joined Bain & Company as a consultant.
Born in Valencia, Spain, Maria now resides in London with her husband and 2 children. In her spare time, Maria enjoys connecting with Depop’s entrepreneurial Gen-Z constituency and promoting women in the workplace
