school statement

Statement on: The Importance of Protecting the Privacy of Student Personal Information

by PolicyPress Release

The following statement can be attributed to Sara Kloek, Vice President, Education and Children’s Policy, Software & Information Industry Association:

The ed tech industry strongly supports efforts to expand opportunities for students to learn and access information, and to help ensure protection of student privacy within the walls of the classroom and when learning remotely. We appreciate the efforts of privacy advocates, researchers, regulators, and journalists over the years to continue to hold industry accountable as the ways students learn continues to evolve. We are proud of efforts across the industry to meet this critical responsibility.

A new report from Human Rights Watch shines light on the importance of protecting the privacy of student personal information. There is a strong framework of laws in the United States that provides the guardrails for technology provider protections on student data privacy, including a ban on targeted advertising to students. While we applaud the intentions of the report, our review of some of the findings reflects potentially meaningful flaws in HRW’s methodology. For example, in some cases HRW analyzed customer-facing websites designed for adults instead of the educational platforms used by students. In those cases, the educational products that students use did not actually include the trackers and cookies outlined in the report.

We urge HRW to reexamine the basis for the findings in the report and issue an amended report that accurately reflects the practices and use of ed tech products. We remain committed to supporting meaningful efforts to ensure that all students have access to educational tools designed to help each individual learner succeed while continuing to uphold our responsibility to protect children’s privacy.

dei assn 100

SIIA President Jeff Joseph Featured on The Association 100 DEI Podcast

by DEI

This week SIIA President Jeff Joseph joins the Association 100 podcast and introduces SIIA’s newest member benefit — a brand new microsite dedicated to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI): siia.net/dei.  Listen to this podcast and hear Jeff share insights on how associations can take a thoughtful approach to DEI; promote better outcomes and how associations can differentiate themselves providing helpful resources for members. He dives into how associations can make an impact; what’s going to add the most valuable to members and how to grow business.

He also talks about looking inward and “walking the walk” as an association by welcoming a diversity of viewpoints in the workforce. To hear this full interview, please visit A Thoughtful Approach to DEI.

fleetowner2

Inclusion, Covering Key Issues, Infographics and Ralph Waldo Emerson Make FleetOwner Special

by Media

This is the first article in an ongoing series on the 2022 Neal Award winners—what makes them special, what is replicable, and what lessons we can learn going forward. Endeavor Business Media’s FleetOwner engages us early with its design and tough stances, gives us easy-to-digest infographics and then pours it on with wonderful prose.

“Today, the words diversity and inclusion go hand in hand,” writes executive editor Cristina Commendatore in an article titled ‘Diversity in Trucking a Must’ in Endeavor Business Media’s 2022 Neal Award-winning issue of FleetOwner. (It won for Best Single Issue of a Tabloid/Newspaper/Magazine – brand revenue $3-7 million.) “Without an inclusive culture, it’s impossible to maintain diversity within any business operation. That’s particularly important for the trucking industry, which has a growing labor shortage and hasn’t traditionally been known as the most diverse industry.”

She points to Total Transportation in Jackson, Miss., which has a team that specializes in going to historically Black colleges and universities to promote the trucking industry. “The company also touts having nearly three times more female drivers than the national average.” “It’s easy to be diverse,” said CEO John Stomps. “Inclusion, however, is a culture; you’ve got to have that from the top down.”

That’s just one informative article in an issue chock full of them. Here are some of the things that the Endeavor Business Media staff got right in putting together this winning issue.

Address issues of the day. There’s an article how the vaccine mandate affects the industry, especially praising truckers. “When many in this nation sheltered in place, you maintained composure and answered the call,” said American Trucking Association CEO Chris Spear. He also praised the infrastructure bill that passed. “This bill is an investment in our economy, in our nation, and in our daily lives.” Other articles include: coverage of driver shortages; Volvo Trucks commitment to offer a fossil-free commercial truck lineup by 2040 and a 50% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2030; a focus on how data previews the tire market; the ecommerce market for truck parts; and an auction by a salesman for Inland Kenworth-Phoenix to benefit Truckers Against Trafficking.

The writing is first-rate. This is not your typical trucking lede—for an article titled The Long and Arduous Journey about the passing of the infrastructure bill: “The road trips we used to take as a kid, whether to Florida or Maine, were inevitably surrounded by great memories that lasted a lifetime,” writes David Heller. “In that regard, I must reference the adage by Ralph Waldo Emerson to describe the recollection of those long family jaunts: ‘Life is a journey, not a destination.’” An IdeaXchange expresses thoughts of many industries. “If we don’t start talking to young people about how important trucking is and the cool technology on trucks, we will have a hard time getting fresh faces behind the wheel.”

A great use of infographics. Trucking by the Numbers – A Supply Chain in Crisis, also by Commendatore, contains 12 pages of infographics, from Freight Forecast by Mode and Type to Substances Identified in Positive Drug Tests to Top Ten Truck Bottlenecks. A couple years ago, I recall Danica Stanciu, vice president for Politico, telling us: “We’ve invested quite a bit in infographics. The use cases for this are myriad. They can be used to help a sales team get up to speed [or] to [assist in] providing content and news to subscribers. Listen to your audience and understand what they need.”

Good use of the last page opinion article. “Last Word” may not be an original title, but Endeavor makes the best use of the space with an article titled “Everyday Heroes,” about proceeds from the sale of a specially built truck going to Truckers Against Trafficking. In 2017 they raised $83,000 and in 2019 $162,000. “Truckers are making a big difference in identifying a reporting possible cases of human trafficking to law enforcement.” “They are our eyes and ears out on the road and are relied upon to report suspicious activity,“ said Kendis Paris, executive director of TAT.

Clever touches. The message from the executive editor is called From My Lane. There’s an excellent top industry concerns column. The biggest 5 issues are: driver shortage, driver retention, driver compensation, lawsuit abuse reform, and truck parking. We can substitute any niche in the first three of those. An article on Yonkers, NY’s 1,400 municipal vehicles tells how they are maintained in a single shop with the latest technology.

Design matters. The red and black cover really shines, with its graphic use of numbers. And then they continue with that image in the contents and the feature article spread. The opening pages offer reports from their conference with an engaging top brick design tying it together. Also impressive is a full-page photo of the manufacturing of direct-fit diesel filters showing a woman doing the fiery work.

Cpa

SIIA Provides Input on Colorado Privacy Act (CPA) to Inform Pre-Rulemaking Session

by Policy

In a letter to Attorney General Weiser, SIIA highlighted the following points that we believe would make the Colorado Privacy Act (CPA) stronger in its implementation:

  • Publicly available information. Many of our members depend on information in the public domain. The current version of the CPA does not appropriately address free speech concerns in its attempt to exempt publicly available information from the definition of personal data. We recommend a definition that adds widely available media – a defined phrase that clearly exempts the republication of information in databases of newspapers, and in unrestricted social media feeds – in addition to information released by the government, which is part of the existing statutory definition.
  • Amend the language to strengthen consumer rights and freedoms. Without this language, covered entities will lack the necessary flexibility to consider when the fulfillment of an individual request may infringe on the privacy of others, especially in circumstances when devices are shared by more than one individual. Other states like Virginia and California take an approach to remedy this problem.
  • Add accommodation for infeasible consumer requests. We recommend Colorado include additional guidelines in statute to denote action taken by data controllers, in the event of technically infeasible or unfounded consumer requests, in an effort to harmonize consumer requests with business compliance.
  • Clarify provisions categorized as “sensitive data”. We recommend clarifying the definition of sensitive data to ensure that consumers and businesses are aligned on the expectations for how sensitive data is treated.
    • First, the Colorado bill should include a clear and concise definition of biometric data. We recommend aligning with the definition of biometric data in Virginia’s privacy law to avoid confusion in practical application of the definition and help in the implementation of the Colorado bill, while avoiding costly implementation challenges.
    • Second, we recommend that the Colorado bill clarify that sensitive data includes data collected from a child, rather than more generally about a child. This change would help the bill to focus on the issue of concern without leading to implementation challenges ancillary to children’s data.

You can read more in the full letter.

Media Library (17)

Statement on: The Competition and Transparency in Digital Advertising Act

by PolicyPress Release

The following statement can be attributed to Jeff Joseph, President, Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA):

“The Competition and Transparency in Digital Advertising Act (CTDA) introduced yesterday by a bipartisan group of senators on the Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust aims to prohibit companies with more than $20 billion in digital ad revenue from running a ‘digital advertising exchange.’  This would force structural and behavioral changes on large and medium-sized companies in the digital advertising space and likely require companies like Google and Meta to sell off parts of their business.

“For companies with more than $5 billion in digital ad revenue, the bill imposes requirements related to greater transparency, an obligation to act in their customers best interests, and to undergo an annual compliance test.

“This bill continues a trend seen in other recently proposed legislation, where legislators seek to use the blunt instrument of antitrust law to punish a handful of large corporations, focusing only on a company’s size, not its conduct. If there are issues that need to be addressed, this is the wrong way to do it. Not only is competition in the digital ad space dynamic, but digital advertising is also what makes the free and open internet that we all enjoy possible. Forcing these changes would give consumers fewer choices that would be more costly.

“We encourage lawmakers to consider other options to resolve conflict of interest concerns such as establishing a code of conduct to mandate individually tailored behavioral changes coupled with auditability that would be implemented across the entire industry, not just to a small group of companies that are disfavored simply because of their size. Our nation has long believed in punishing companies for bad behavior, not for their success. That principle should continue to stand in the digital age.”