Google's First Urban Development Raises Data Concerns

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Washington Post: A unit of Google's parent company Alphabet is proposing to turn a rundown part of Toronto's waterfront into what may be the most wired community in history -- to "fundamentally refine what urban life can be." Sidewalk Labs has partnered with a government agency known as Waterfront Toronto with plans to erect mid-rise apartments, offices, shops and a school on a 12-acre (4.9-hectare) site -- a first step toward what it hopes will eventually be a 800-acre (325-hectare) development. High-level interest is clear: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Alphabet's then-Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt appeared together to announce the plan in October. But some Canadians are rethinking the privacy implications (Warning: source may be paywalled; alternative source) of giving one of the most data-hungry companies on the planet the means to wire up everything from street lights to pavement. And some want the public to get a cut of the revenue from products developed using Canada's largest city as an urban laboratory.

"The Waterfront Toronto executives and board are too dumb to realize they are getting played," said former BlackBerry chief executive Jim Balsillie, a smartphone pioneer considered a national hero who also said the federal government is pushing the board to approve it. "Google knew what they wanted. And the politicians wanted a PR splash and the Waterfront board didn't know what they are doing. And the citizens of Toronto and Canada are going to pay the price," Balsillie said. Complaints about the proposed development prompted Waterfront Toronto to re-do the agreement to ensure a greater role for the official agency, which represents city, provincial and federal governments. So far the project is still in the embryonic stage. After consultations, the developers plan to present a formal master plan early next year. Sidewalk Labs' CEO, Dan Doctoroff, says the company isn't looking to monetizing people's personal information in the way that Google does now with search information. He said the plan is to invent so-far-undefined products and services that Sidewalk Labs can market elsewhere. "People automatically assume because of our relationship to Alphabet and Google that they will be treated one way or another. We have never said anythingâ about the data issue, he said. "To be honest people should give us some time. Be patient."

An ad company

[AHuxley]

is going to do ads.
What an ISP? Use an ISP.

Nah

[sexconker]

Shops, offices, apartments, and a school on 12 acres of waterfront?
That's only 792x660 feet! 0.01875 square miles!

Re:

[rtb61]

It seems like rather short sighted thinking, is that property water front or underwater front but of course it's actually lakefront, so not a problem, probably.

Want to do something new and different, create an above ground level basement across the whole site, creating access for vehicles and services below foot traffic level. Services would be much more accessible in bulkheads between structural elements and of course car traffic no longer interferes with human traffic, creating a more walkable environmen

Google

[fluffernutter]

The first person I don't trust is Google. The second person I don't trust is anyone affiliated with Google.

I don't mind being played.

[ARos]

Please upgrade the awful infrastructure where I live, since the public sector is BEYOND incompetent. I'll just live my life in incognito mode to avoid the surveillance concerns.

"My god, man, get yourself a writer" - Mentok

[sheramil]

Perhaps he meant "fundamentally re-define". Refining a run-down waterfront might turn it into a less run-down waterfront.

Not sure what this would look like?

[93 Escort Wagon]

Just rewatch the scene from Minority Report where Tom Cruise tries to stay anonymous while walking by some advertisements. Then watch it again, and again.

So they WILL be collecting personal information

[khchung]

Sidewalk Labs' CEO, Dan Doctoroff, says the company isn't looking to monetizing people's personal information in the way that Google does now with search information.

So they are saying they WILL collect people's personal information, just that they are "not looking" to monetize it as Google does, now.

You bet that when they got the data and have them ready to be sold, they WILL be looking to monetize it.

Or more simply, they just send the data to Google for free (thus "not monetizing it") and let Google sell it, Alphabet will get the money in the end.

Re:So they WILL be collecting personal information

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Don't worry, before they monetize it there will be an update to the TOS. And people who don't agree to the new terms will be able to quit their jobs, pull their kids out of school and move to a different city.

the big question

[astrofurter]

What I really want to know - and i think we're all wondering this - is where will they build the statue of Joseph Stalin? How big will it be? Who will be the sculptor?

Data

[easyTree]

Sidewalk Labs' CEO, Dan Doctoroff, says the company isn't looking to monetizing people's personal information in the way that Google does now with search

Interesting. People's personal information will me monetised in a slightly different manner.

Xinjiang is the most wired community

[clawsoon]

Xinjiang is already the most wired community in history [meduza.io].

Soldiers had taken telephones from the tourists who were undergoing examination near us and had begun to install a special app called JingWang Weishi that is used in Xinjiang for surveillance of the Muslim population. JingWang sends the police an identification number for the device, its model, and the telephone number of its owner before monitoring all the information that passes through the telephone, warning the user when it finds content that the government deems dangerous. ...

Three years ago, the Chinese government announced that private and state-owned CCTV surveillance systems that use facial recognition would be unified into a shared database that would encompass the entire population by 2020.

Xinjiang, which had also been the site of the first Chinese nuclear weapons tests, was once again chosen as the site of a pilot experiment. This is where the majority of the 20 million CCTV cameras at work in the country are located. ... Now, Chinese police can find and arrest any suspect in a crowd whose facial features correspond with existing data in the country’s grandiose central database in the course of seven minutes or less. ...

CCTV cameras are everywhere: on the roofs of houses, on brackets attached to the walls of buildings, on street lamps, and on metal racks installed specially over the streets for the express purpose of housing cameras. The city is split into square regions, and in order to cross from one quarter into another, every Uyghur must display a plastic ID, hand over any bags or purses to be searched, undergo a pupil scan, and, in some cases, surrender a mobile phone for inspection. The same procedure awaits them at the bank, in the hospital, at the supermarket, and at underground crosswalks. ...

The loyalty point system, which is officially called a “social credit system,” was announced in China four years ago. No one knows exactly how the system works, but it is known that people’s ratings are calculated using the entire mass of information that the government gathers about its citizens. Financial debt, traffic tickets, reprehensible behavior online (including “harmful shopping”), and smoking in public can all affect a person’s score. One can earn points by donating blood, volunteering, or writing an ode to the Communist Party. But they are also easy to lose — playing too many video games or visiting the mosque too often is enough. Visits to unstable regions are also taken into account, as are conversations with less desirable people that are recorded on surveillance video. ...

In Xinjiang, where every resident is almost constantly under surveillance, this futuristic nightmare quickly took on the qualities of a bloody dystopia. The artificial intelligence system that analyzes personal data about people divides society into “safe,” “average,” and “dangerous” citizens. Age, religion, previous convictions, and contact with foreigners are all taken into account. It is very likely that samples of DNA might affect residents’ scores in the near future, as well, if they are not part of the system already.

In September 2016, the first open calls were issued online for genotyping kits to be produced for police use in China, and just two months later, Human Rights Watch announced that DNA sampling had become mandatory in Xinjiang for all those receiving a new passport. Samples are gathered in schools and workplaces, and police officers can also enter people’s homes to take them.

Pavement?

[Daralantan]

giving one of the most data-hungry companies on the planet the means to wire up everything from street lights to pavement.

What data are they going to get from the pavement? A fat person walks on it, and suddenly starts getting ads for exercise and diet DVDs/books/etc?

Not a matter of patience

[ilsaloving]

This isn't an issue of patience. It's an issue of experience and trust. Over and over and over and over again, corporations have demonstrated that they WILL screw over the average person. They WILL siphon any and all personal data they can get away with. They will do whatever it takes to make a cheap buck, even if (possibly especially if) it saddles the taxpayer with a huge bill.

The people don't need to be patient. Sidewalk Labs need to prove that they arn't going to screw everyone over.