Digital Identity Digest (April 2019)
Are universities more vulnerable to academic dishonesty? In April, actor Felicity Huffman and 12 other parents decided to plead guilty in the largest-ever college admissions scandal in the U.S. She is accused of paying to falsify her children’s test scores to secure admission to elite colleges. Echoing the scandal, NPR discusses how students are finding […]
Digital Identity Digest (March 2019)
What are universities doing with all the data they collect about you? The Ubyssey published an article about how UBC intends to use students’ data to provide insights to support teaching and learning through its learning analytics project. Although it sounds like a positive development in education, some people are concerned about whether the extensive […]
Digital Identity Digest (February 2019)
Are we more exposed with the incoming 5G tech? Developments in 5G technology have been hitting the headlines over and over this year. In Canada, the diplomatic dispute around the Chinese company Huawei is only one of the layers of the discussion. As CBC reports, this is even impacting a possible government decision to ban […]
Digital Identity Digest (January 2019)
What is the best educational measure against piracy? Canada’s government has amended its Copyright Act to clarify that piracy notices can’t demand cash from Canadians. The piracy-notice system took effect in 2015, allowing “copyright holders to send warning emails to people suspected of illegally downloading content such as movies or music,” CBC explains. According to […]
Digital Identity Digest (December 2018)
Do the benefits of having a Facebook account outweigh the risks? In December, Facebook hit the headlines once again for a privacy scandal. This time, they revealed that a Photo API bug gave some third-party apps too much access to the photos of up to 6.8 million users. According to their statement, developers might have […]
Digital Identity Digest (November 2018)
Have you ever lied on a dating app? Online dating apps are very popular, but they can have some pitfalls. Irina Manta, a law professor at New York’s Hofstra University and founder of its Center for Intellectual Property Law, wrote to the Washington Post that obtaining sex through fraud on dating apps should be legally […]
Digital Identity Digest (October 2018)
Could facial recognition be a tool for dangerous mass surveillance? An Amazon employee published an anonymous op-ed on Medium speaking out against the company’s decision to sell its facial recognition product, Rekognition, to police in the U.S. They believe it’s a system for dangerous mass surveillance, which reinforces existing bias as demonstrated in a test […]
Digital Identity Digest (September 2018)
Facebook’s largest security breach in history The biggest news of September came right in the end of the month. Facebook announced that an attack on its computer network had exposed personal information of almost 50 million users. The New York Times reported it was the largest breach in the company’s history. The attackers exploited a […]
Digital Identity Digest (February)
The Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto It’s not everyday that an edgy, youth-focused, and (amazingly) growing media organization names a professor of political science one of their “humans of the year,” but this is exactly what happened for Ron Deibert. Motherboard, the science and technology section of Vice, has added Deibert into their ongoing series because […]
Digital Identity Digest (December)
Canadian precedent emerging for teen sexting A 16-year-old boy from Newfoundland received a sentence of 18-month probation for sharing naked photos of his 15-year-old girlfriend. He pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography and avoided the more serious charge of distribution. In Canada, he could have faced the same charge even if he had not shared the images. It […]
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