Center on Privacy & Technology

Unproven Vape Detection Tech Expands Surveillance in Schools, Threatening Privacy | TechPolicy.Press The marketing of AI-driven surveillance solutions to schools is outpacing administrators’ capacity to establish good policies, says a team of researchers.

Our former Senior Associate Clarence Okoh co-wrote an article for Tech Policy Press detailing the risks associated with the implementation of AI-powered surveillance tools in schools, titled "Unproven Vape Detection Tech Expands Surveillance in Schools, Threatening Privacy." Read it here:

Check it out: The Metropolitan Washington Workshop on Immigration & Race is holding a discussion TOMORROW. Join for a discussion on how the US surveillance apparatus built on migrant data extractivism extends to all of society. Register here: go.gwu.edu/mwwir.

In September we released an update to our 2024 report, “Raiding the Gnome,” showing that CBP has taken DNA from ~2,000 U.S. citizens without any judicial oversight. The program is illegal and impacts everyone. Hear more from our Director of Research & Advocacy:

OP-ED: Baltimore County must protect Black children from dangerous A.I. Here's how. Big Tech is known to “move fast and break things.” But who is left in pieces? Residents in Baltimore County recently witnessed a new technology nearly shatter a child’s life.   Last week, a squad of p...

Our Senior Associate Clarence Okoh recently co-authored an article titled, “Baltimore County must protect Black children from dangerous tech. Here’s how.” The article describes how the discrepancies in AI detection systems in schools are putting children at risk as opposed to keeping them safe.

Our ED Emily Tucker is speaking on the “Responsible AI and Privacy” panel hosted by Good Systems at UT-Austin this Wednesday 11/19 at 10 AM CST. Join for a discussion about where privacy stands in the technological revolution of AI! Register here (Zoom available): responsibleai2025.splashthat.com.

The book is written by Robin Mansell, Flavia Durach, PhD, Matthias C. Kettemann, Théophile Lenoir, Rob Procter, Gyan Tripathi, and our executive director Emily Tucker and is now available to download as Open Access here: www.nordicom.gu.se/en/publicati...

How do news media, AI and data governance shape the information we all rely on? 👉 Nordicom recently published “Information Ecosystems and Troubled Democracy: The State of Knowledge on News Media, AI, and Data Governance.”

American Dragnet | Data-Driven Deportation in the 21st Century One of two American adults is in a law enforcement face recognition database. An investigation.

The Privacy Center reported extensively on this sharing (which happens through an entity called "Nlets," a non profit org run by reps from all 50 states) in our 2022 report American Dragnet.
americandragnet.org

congressional-DMV-ICE-letter-to-dem-governors

Read this letter from Sen. Wyden and 39 other lawmakers to state governors warning them that they are sharing their residents' data with ICE. www.documentcloud.org/documents/26...

This Fall, we welcomed Ayah Eldosougi, our new Fritz Fellow, and Taman Mohamed, our new Justice Fellow. They recently sat down to talk privacy, power, and podcasts. Read their conversation here: medium.com/@georgetownp...

The fellowship will provide support for the project and will connect Stevie and her team to an interdisciplinary group of scholars and advocates across the university. Congrats, Stevie!

Home - Gender+ Justice Initiative Our Mission Why the “+”? The “+” in “Gender+ Justice” signifies that while gender is central to our focus, we also address how it intersects with race, class, sexuality, disability, and other markers ...

The Gender+ Justice Initiative aims to “catalyze scholarship and advocacy” on “intersectional gender and racial justice” issues. Stevie was selected based on her work investigating the intersection of family regulation and reproductive health care.

Join us in congratulating our Director of Research & Advocacy Stevie Glaberson for being selected to join the 2025-26 cohort of Gender+ Justice Initiative Fellows!

Our ED Emily Tucker spoke with @politico.com’s Alfred Ng about ICE's new contract for skip tracing for today’s Morning Tech newsletter. “It’s surveillance that targets people that are typically hard to find in the databases that already exist,” said Tucker.

📢📢📢 Don’t miss this great event happening TODAY!
Join us to learn how 5 experts have made their own path in the privacy field.

Corporations call it "privacy-preserving," but this new AI tech isn't all that it seems.

Our new brief w/@datasociety.bsky.social + CoWorker exposes how this tech harms + exploits workers and what we can do to strengthen worker protections + power in the digital age: datasociety.net/library/the-...

We’re interested in hearing from folks who’ve been subject to this DNA collection, and in exploring ways to help people defend their rights. To help us learn more about the federal government's growing genetic surveillance powers, email us at privacy@georgetown.edu.

Last month, we published new research about CBP’s collection of DNA from US citizens. In a new blog post, our Associate @ehtse.bsky.social writes about the widespread risks of genetic surveillance and our ongoing research into DHS’s DNA collection program. Read it here:

A Georgetown Law Digital Inclusion Week Event Join us for a special Digital Inclusion Week event featuring Dr. Nicol Turner Lee, Director of the Center for Technology Innovation at the Brookings Institution and author of Digitally Invisible: How ...

Details:
📅Friday, October 10
🕥10:30 - 11:30 AM
📍6th Floor Lounge, 500 First Street NW
🖊️RSVP: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

🚨TOMORROW! Curious about the implications that technology access has on the economic and social participation of communities marginalized by the structural barriers of inequity? Dr. Nicol Turner Lee will discuss her book, “Digitally Invisible: How the Internet is Creating the New Underclass.”

Details:
📅 Mon Oct 20
🕥 3:30 - 5:00 PM
📍6th Floor Lounge, 500 First Street NW
🖊️RSVP:

📢 Georgetown students!! Interested in a career in privacy? Join us on October 20 to hear from professionals who’ve found a range of pathways to their careers in privacy.

A Georgetown Law Digital Inclusion Week Event Join us for a special Digital Inclusion Week event featuring Dr. Nicol Turner Lee, Director of the Center for Technology Innovation at the Brookings Institution and author of Digitally Invisible: How ...

Hosted by @gtwontechlaw.bsky.social and co-hosted by Georgetown's Tech and Society, the Benton Institute for Broadband and Society, Public Knowledge, and us at the Privacy Center!

Details:
📅Friday, October 10
🕥10:30 - 11:30 AM
📍6th Floor Lounge, 500 First Street NW
🖊️RSVP:

Dr. Lee, author of “Digitally Invisible: How the Internet is Creating the New Underclass,”will offer insights on the impact on all of us from the barriers to digital inclusion.

Digital Inclusion Week is here and we have an event for you! Dr. Nicol Turner Lee of @brookings.edu will join us to discuss what digital equity can look like as the importance of internet access in the US for economic participation continues to increase.

Aunque esta actualización se centra en ciudadanos estadounidenses, el programa de recolección de ADN del DHS afecta a todas las personas en los Estados Unidos, independientemente de su ciudadanía. Para evitar un futuro de vigilancia genética universal, debemos impedir que el DHS asalte el genoma.

Supreme Court blesses racial profiling by ICE The conservative justices don't explain a decision that green lights detaining people for how they look.

La falta de salvaguardias internas plantea preocupaciones constitucionales serias. Esto es alarmante dado un fallo de la Corte Suprema que eliminó la prohibición contra el perfilamiento racial por parte de agentes migratorios, ignorando años de jurisprudencia por la 4.ª Enmienda de la Constitución.

Los agentes de CBP no siempre explicaron por qué tomaban ADN de ciudadanos. Cuando dieron una razón, a veces se basaron en infracciones no criminales. Aun así, no existen mecanismos estructurales para identificar casos en los que CBP recolecta ADN sin razón o motivos suficientes.

En cientos de casos, estas investigaciones nunca resultaron en cargos federales formales. Muchas veces la CBP no tenía base para sospechar una violación legal, decidió no remitir el caso a fiscales federales, o los fiscales optaron por no presentar cargos.

Entre 2020 y 2024, Aduanas y Protección Fronteriza (CBP) a sabiendas tomó el ADN de aproximadamente 2,000 ciudadanos estadounidenses. Sus muestras fueron enviadas al FBI para ingresarlas en CODIS, una base de datos de vigilancia federal.