Freedom and Technology

FREEDOM AND TECHNOLOGY: 2006-2007

The DCF’s theme for the academic year 2006-2007 was Freedom and Technology.
Technology and Freedom are inextricably linked. Technology can be liberating – freeing us from physically hard and time-consuming labor, granting us access to information and knowledge, and moving us about the world. Technology can be equally, often simultaneously, imprisoning. Technology can be used to track our movements, spy on our private lives, manipulate power differentials and create dependencies on tools many of us do not understand. The events in this series examined the nexus of freedom and technology to better understand how humanity and technology may best interact and coexist.

Events offered by the DCF:
October 19, 2006: e-Voting. A public lecture by Dan Wallach, Rice University
Hanging chads, among other issues with traditional voting systems, have sparked great interest in managing the election process through the use of newer electronic voting systems. While computer scientists, for the most part, have been warning of the perils of such action, vendors have forged ahead with their products, claiming increased security, reliability, and accuracy. Many municipalities have adopted electronic systems and the number of deployed systems is rising.
This talk described problems Wallach’s research team and other researchers have discovered and considered the limitations of the certification processes that should have guaranteed some quality control. It also considered how both established and open research in software engineering, distributed systems, and cryptography can and should impact the next generation of voting systems. January 10, 2007: Tech@Tuck: Managing Consumer Data
On January 10, Tech@Tuck examined how firms make decisions about what consumer data they collect and use to enhance their products or services. This event included both targeted information sessions and a panel discussion. Members of the panel discussion included:
Facebook — Chris Kelly, VP, Corporate Development & Chief Privacy Officer
Starwood Hotels — Amy Weinberg, VP, Customer Insight
Time Warner Cable — Craig Goldberg, Chief Privacy Officer
Yahoo! — Anke Audenaert, VP, Content Optimization
Marianne Weems, artistic director of the Builders Association and Hopkins Center Artist-in-Residence, also joined the panel to discuss these issues as they related to the identity play Super Vision (see “Related Events” below).

January 17, 2007: The Use and Abuse of Consumer Data, Hosted by the Allwin Initiative for Corporate Citizenship
As the technology for accumulating and analyzing personal information become more sophisticated, the use of this data for commercial purposes raises questions about the violation of consumer privacy.
This forum included two expert panelists who discussed how this data is collected and processed, what protections are in place, and where there are risks of abuse.

Robert Ellis Smith, publisher of Privacy Journal. Smith is an experienced journalist, a lawyer, and author of several books on privacy. A graduate of Harvard College and Georgetown University Law Center, Smith was a daily news reporter, weekly newspaper editor, and assistant director of civil rights in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services before starting Privacy Journal in 1974.

Katherine Bryant, Vice President Consumer Advocacy, ChoicePoint. Bryant is a veteran member of ChoicePoint's legal team with extensive experience in the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), which is the federal law that grants consumers a wide range of rights related to the use of their information when applying for a job, home or auto insurance or a rental residence.
Rick Shreve, Adjunct Professor of Business Ethics, moderated the discussion.
April 9, 2007: Wireless ID Issues: Privacy, Efficiency and Security
The increasingly pervasive technology of Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) tags provide huge potential benefits – in tracking inventory and shipping, for example – and potential risks to personal security and privacy – when RFID is used for identifying or tracking people. RFIDs already appear in the millions in retail, passports, car keys, credit cards, and even pets. In this panel discussion we heard about the technology, policy, commercial, and legal aspects of this exciting technology.
This event was covered by The Dartmouth and can be viewed here.
Video of the event is available in the Jones Media Center at Dartmouth College.
You may also view the slides (from some panelists) or the remarks from Frank Moss.

Panelists included:

Prof. Sanjay Sarma Prof. Kevin Fu Prof. Deirdre Mulligan
Mechanical Engineering Computer Science School of Law
MIT U. Massachusetts Amherst U. California Berkeley

Dr. Charles Palmer Mr. Frank Moss
IBM Research U.S. Department of State
(Retired)

Events offered related to the theme:
November 27, 2006: The Day the Earth Stood Still, a classic 1951 film. A discussion followed, led by Professor Ned Lebow.
January 12 and 13, 2007: Super Vision, a play at the Hop.
April 14-15, 2007: Nanotechnology and Human Enhancement. Funded by the NSF; organized by Professor Jim Moore; co-sponsored by the Ethics Institute.

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Rockefeller Center for Public Policy and the Social Sciences • William Jewett Tucker Foundation