States shouldn’t wait for federal action on data privacy, says one expert

Connecticut Attorney General William Tong recently recommended that the state’s lawmakers strengthen a statewide privacy law enacted two years ago, including by sending “warning letters” to violators and investigating consumer complaints. Kara Williams, law fellow at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, joins the Priorities Podcast to share why she thinks Connecticut’s law is weak in some respects, but that changes could create a “cascading effect” that leads other states to strengthen their data privacy laws or create new ones. “It’s encouraging to see that the AG advocates for this strong data minimization framework,” she says, “but it’s also great to see that some of these principles are included in [a proposed] update bill. … It’s not really an option to sit and wait for the federal government to act on privacy.”

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The National Telecommunications and Information Administration on Tuesday notified states that they’ve been granted a 90-day extension to submit their final spending proposals for the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program.

Like most large government organizations, Oklahoma has for years been using various AI tools and machine learning models to trawl endless network logs for abnormal activity. After several years of using network monitoring software from the British firm Darktrace in “human confirmation mode,” Oklahoma last year allowed the company’s “Cyber AI Analyst” product to make decisions on its own.

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro on Monday launched a WhatsApp channel, with an English and Spanish language option, aimed at providing residents with updates on state news, services and initiatives.

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