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Utah Lawsuit Says TikTok Intentionally Lures Children Into Addictive, Harmful Behavior
The state of Utah on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against TikTok, claiming the company is “baiting” children and teens into harmful social media habits.
The lawsuit, filed in state court in Salt Lake City, accuses TikTok of luring young users with its “highly powerful algorithms and manipulative design features,” creating addictive and unhealthy habits among consumers. Utah claims that the company misrepresents the app’s safety and deceptively portrays itself as independent of ByteDance, its Chinese parent company.
The lawsuit is the latest attempt by lawmakers to regulate and hold social media companies accountable for their content and protection of users’ private data. During a news conference alongside Gov. Spencer Cox, Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes said his “top priority” is to protect children in the state.
Utah officials cited public health concerns and research showing the impact social media has on children’s mental health, including risks of depression, anxiety, higher levels of developmental sensitivity and disruptions to neurological development.
Costco Allegedly Shares Private Customer Info With Meta: Lawsuit
Costco is being accused of violating state and federal law by sharing the private healthcare information of millions of Americans with Facebook-parent Meta without their consent, according to a lawsuit filed Friday.
The warehouse club embedded Meta Platforms, Inc.’s Pixel Code, an analytical tool that tracks visitor’s activities, on its website, which allowed it to share “Pharmacy patients’ highly sensitive Personal Health Information and Personally Identifiable Information to third parties including Meta Platforms,” the suit stated.
The suit said that when customers “attempted to log in to their patient accounts, searched for prescriptions and related pricing, and inquired about immunizations, among other sensitive health-related topics, Pixel secretly intercepted, recorded, and transmitted those private communications to Meta.”
The sensitive information that was allegedly shared with third parties included, but was not limited to, computer IP addresses, patient status, prescription information, immunization information, treatments, patient location and health insurance coverage, the lawsuit continued.
California’s New Delete Act Is One of the World’s Most Powerful Privacy Laws
A new law in California gives consumers the power to do something meaningful about the companies buying and selling their data for the very first time. On Tuesday, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the Delete Act into law, introducing a number of provisions that beef up state privacy regulations. Among other stipulations, it lets Californians force every data broker to delete the fruits of their data harvest with one, single click.
California and several other states already require most companies to delete the information they collect on request. Unfortunately, the process is close to useless, because you need to contact every business individually. You also have to live in a fantasy world where you know the names of even a fraction of the businesses that spy on you for cash.
The Delete Act will create a system where you can make one single request that forces the entire data broker industry to delete the details they harvest from your life. It’s the first regulation of its kind from a major government.
Texas Lawmakers Again Try to Prohibit Private Businesses From Requiring COVID Vaccines
Conservative Texas lawmakers are taking another shot at prohibiting private businesses from requiring employees to get COVID-19 vaccines. The new legislation comes after years of Republican attempts to reign in COVID-related restrictions like mask mandates and vaccine requirements.
Senate Bill 7, by Galveston Republican Sen. Mayes Middleton, offers no exceptions to its proposed ban on vaccine mandates by private businesses and would subject employers to state fines and other actions if they fire or punish employees who refuse the shot. The Senate Health and Human Services Committee quickly passed the bill Tuesday, the second day of a special legislative session.
In late 2021, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott issued an executive order banning the mandates, but it touched off confusion over who was covered by the order and how enforceable it was. That order expired in June, triggering a legislative attempt to codify it during the regular session earlier this year. After that attempt failed, Abbott added the issue to the agenda for this year’s third special legislative session.
A new state law banning governmental entities from requiring the COVID-19 vaccine went into effect last month.
Baltimore Law Firm Sued Over COVID Vaccine Mandate Policy
A former legal secretary is suing Tydings & Rosenberg LLP over the law firm’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate for employees.
The federal civil rights lawsuit claims the firm rejected a religious exemption for the ex-employee, Cheryl Shigley, and ultimately terminated her in September 2021.
Shigley’s suit asks a judge to reinstate her job at Tydings and order the firm to provide back pay and punitive damages.
The company has also not offered to reinstate Shigley as concerns about COVID-19 have waned, the complaint alleges.
BC Court Hears Merits in Vaccine Mandates Appeal, Rules Moot for Second Time
A provincial court in BC ruled a vaccine mandate appeal moot last week for the second time since its implementation — this time in a higher court.
The appeal, made by the Canadian Constitution Foundation (CCF), was against the government-issued vaccine passports people were required to show at restaurants, gyms, libraries and other public spaces during the COVID-19 pandemic. It specifically focused on the lack of exemptions offered by the BC government.
The court gave the written ruling in court Friday, after orally stating the case was moot on Wednesday. However, it emphasized the importance of the CCF appeal to proceed and “outline the merits of the case,” because public interest was substantial enough for the court to hear the case anyway.
“This is one of those few rare cases where we’re actually going to be hearing the appeal in a COVID-era case about vaccines, on the merits of the case,” Christine Van Geyn, litigation director of CCF, said in a video overview of the case.
From France to Ireland, the EU Spyware Problem Is Even Worse Than We Thought
About two years after the Pegasus scandal drew back the curtains to reveal the lengths governments can go to spy on their citizens, another investigation has revealed that the EU has a spyware problem bigger than we could possibly imagine.
According to Donncha Ó Cearbhaill, Head of Amnesty International’s Security Lab, Predator “is arguably worse” than similar NSO-developed software. This is primarily because the tool wasn’t just used across the EU this time, but was developed, sold, and exported by EU-based firms mainly operating across France, Ireland, and Greece.
Now, a joint year-long investigation by media partners from the European Investigative Collaborations (EIC) and Amnesty International’s Security Lab can reveal the failures of the EU in regulating highly lucrative and unethical surveillance business.
“The Predator Files investigation shows what we have long feared: that highly invasive surveillance products are being traded on a near industrial scale and are free to operate in the shadows without oversight or any genuine accountability,” said Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s Secretary General.
