Daniel Castro

The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) recently denied a U.S. freight railroad permission to use autonomous track inspection technology, a loss for those promoting greater use of automation to enhance rail safety and lower costs in the supply chain.

Multi-user immersive experiences (MUIEs)—three-dimensional, digitally rendered environments where multiple users can interact with other people and virtual objects in real time—present new content-moderation challenges. Policymakers should work with those developing MUIEs to balance user safety, privacy, and free expression.

Senator Klobuchar (D-MN), chairwoman of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Competition Policy, Antitrust, and Consumer Rights held a hearing earlier this month about the role of competition on the press in the United States. The hearing served as a platform to promote the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act, bipartisan legislation introduced in both the House and the Senate that would create a four-year safe harbor from antitrust laws to allow news media companies to negotiate compensation terms with large online platforms collectively

Last year, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) announced that it was going to begin using facial recognition to improve its identity verification process when taxpayers access its online tools (e.g., to get a copy of their tax records) to increase consumer security and reduce fraud. To do this, taxpayers would upload a copy of their government ID, along with a video selfie, to verify their identity.

In the absence of a federal privacy law, a growing patchwork of state laws burdens companies with multiple, duplicative compliance costs. The out-of-state costs from 50 such laws could exceed $1 trillion over 10 years, with at least $200 billion hitting small businesses.

Data privacy legislation has been on the Congressional to-do list for years, but as more states consider their own comprehensive privacy laws and Europe’s privacy regulation approaches its fifth anniversary, the federal government continues to lag behind.

Proponents say requiring Apple to allow users to install apps from other app stores would foster competition and consumer choice. In reality, it would do the exact opposite: Forcing Apple to abandon its closed mobile ecosystem would eliminate an important alternative to open mobile ecosystems.

As the bill is currently worded, it opens the door for almost any competing business user to demand access to core functionality of large platforms, even if it would significantly harm consumers.

Especially as autonomous vehicles become more common on city streets, it's in everyone's interest for states to offer fully digital e-titles to decrease costs, streamline processing and reduce fraud risk.

CNIL, the French Data Protection Authority, recently ordered Clearview AI, a U.S. company that offers law enforcement a “search engine for faces,” to delete all of its data about French data subjects.

As the United States and the European Union continue to work on building back better the transatlantic relationship in the coming year, they should make resolving data flows a top priority.

Although digitizing government has become easier, the amount of unstructured data agencies hold remains a steep barrier to full transparency. Artificial intelligence could be the answer.