A new White House website "Artificial Intelligence for the American People" emphasizes "AI for American Innovation, AI for American Industry, AI for the American Worker, and AI with American Values," but still provides no opportunities for public input. The National Commission on Artificial Intelligence, tasked with advising the federal government on AI policy, also recently held its first meeting in secret. Last year, EPIC—joined by nearly 100 experts and leading scientific organizations including AAAS, ACM, FAS, and IEEE—successfully petitioned the White House Select Committee on Artificial Intelligence to incorporate public input in the committee's work. EPIC has urged US support for the Universal Guidelines for AI, a policy framework emphasizing fairness, accountability, and transparency for AI systems.
U.S. Senators Roy Blunt [R-MO] and Brian Schatz [D-HI] introduced a bill to protect consumers from companies collecting facial images. Senator Schatz said: "Our faces are our identities. They're personal. So the responsibility is on companies to ask people for their permission before they track and analyze their faces." EPIC previously urged the FTC to stop Facebook's use of facial recognition to capture personal identity. In 2018, EPIC charged that Facebook's facial recognition practices lacks privacy safeguards and violate the 2011 Consent Order with the FTC. EPIC has urged the FTC to #EnforceTheOrder as a one-year deadline approaches.
In his dissenting opinion in Frank v. Gaos, Justice Thomas set out two key guidelines for future consumer privacy litigation. First, Justice Thomas said that consumer privacy cases could go forward when a "private right" is violated, such as when a violation of a federal privacy law is alleged. The Supreme Court adopted a somewhat more narrow standard in the Spokeo v. Robbins case. Second, Justice Thomas made clear that class action settlements must provide a "meaningful" benefit to class members, which could include monetary relief or a change in business practices. Justice Thomas opposed the settlement in Gaos, explaining "because the class members here received no settlement fund, no meaningful injunctive relief, and no other benefit whatsoever in exchange for the settlement of their claims...." Justice Thomas did not rule out cy pres remainder settlements for "disposing of unclaimed or undistributable class funds" or cy pres-only settlements that provide some actual benefit to class members. EPIC set out very similar views in an amicus brief for the Supreme Court in the Gaos case, in related amicus briefs on standing and in court filings on class action fairness, as well as an academic article calling for reform of cy pres settlements.
