Welcome back to Lately, The Globe’s weekly tech newsletter. If you have feedback or just want to say hello to a real-life human, send me an e-mail.
In this week’s issue:
🚓 Hootsuite seeks contracts with ICE
⛔ Will Ottawa ban social media for children under 14?
🧑🏻⚖️ If Big Tech governs our lives, it’s time they’re held accountable
⏰ Why the internet is romanticizing 2016
SURVEILLANCE
Hootsuite eyeing business with ICE for monitoring social media
Federal law enforcement agents confront anti-ICE protesters in Minneapolis, Minn.OCTAVIO JONES/AFP/Getty Images
Once a Canadian tech darling, Hootsuite has been pursuing business with Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the United States to provide social-media management services to the agency. According to internal documents obtained by The Globe and Mail, the Vancouver-based company has discussed monitoring conversations and sentiment on social media related to ICE, also known as “social listening,” including about the agency’s operations in specific cities.
In September, Hootsuite landed a US$95,000 pilot project with ICE, which stems from existing work with Customs and Border Protection and the Department of Homeland Security. The scope of Hootsuite’s work with ICE and CBP is not clear.
More than five years ago, Hootsuite backtracked on a contract with ICE after widespread employee backlash. At the time, then-CEO Tom Keiser said the deal had “created a divided company, and this is not the kind of company I came to lead.”
On Thursday, Hootsuite’s CEO Irina Novoselsky defended the contract, telling employees the deal will stand so long as ICE abides by the terms of service. Hootsuite’s terms of service prohibit use of its platform for law enforcement, surveillance and tracking.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Ottawa drafting plans to ban social media for children under 14
Federal officials have drawn up plans to include a ban on social media for children under the age of 14 as part of the government’s coming online harms bill, according to three sources who spoke with The Globe. The measure, which would first need cabinet approval, is expected to be considered as early as next month.
In Canada, social media is currently banned for children under the age of 13, but this is widely unenforced. Kids can make their own social media accounts by lying about their age at sign-up or view content without being logged into an account. Major tech companies, such as Meta, Google and Snap, are not responsible for verifying the ages of its users, so it’s up to parents to monitor their children’s social media use.
Last year, Australia became the first country in the world to impose a large-scale social media ban for children under 16, requiring tech companies to block or remove the accounts of users underage, or face fines up to 49.5-million Australian dollars. In the wake of the Australian law, other countries have debated introducing similar restrictions.
As I mentioned last week, I’m working on an article about how Canadian teens feel about social media bans for those under 16 and I’m looking for a few more people to chat with. If you are a teen, or have a teen in your life who may be interested in being interviewed, send me an e-mail at sedwards@globeandmail.com
BIG TECH
Big Tech rules so much of our lives. They should take accountability
Two years ago, a faulty software update from a little-known cybersecurity company brought the world to a halt: Global air travel was grounded, hospitals couldn’t access medical records, banks froze payments. The CrowdStrike outage laid clear just how interconnected many of our services have become, and the far-reaching consequences when one of those systems fails. Wendy H. Wong, a professor of political science and the author of We, the Data: Human Rights in the Digital Age, wrote an op-ed for The Globe arguing that since Big Tech companies effectively govern our lives, it’s time they’re held accountable for it.
“When we say ‘Big Tech,’ we mean the many companies that govern our lives, through their platforms that traffic in data,” Wong writes. “It’s time we acknowledge that governance explicitly. As governors, Big Tech companies should take accountability for the outsized role they play in our lives.” Read the full opinion editorial here.
What else we’re reading this week:
Betting on prediction markets is their job. They make millions (The New York Times)
White House shares doctored image portraying arrested church protester in tears (The Washington Post)
Evan Solomon wants Canada to trust AI. Can we trust Evan Solomon? (The Walrus)
Adult Money
DIGITAL DETOX
The Lamy Safari fountain pen, $40-ish
Fountain pens at Phidon Pens Limited in Cambridge, Ont.Arman Duggal/Supplied
For this week’s Adult Money pick, I’m going decidedly analogue: fountain pens. The old-timey, elegant, if not messy, writing instrument is making a comeback, driven by young adults who are embracing its tactile nature. Some stylophiles are drawn to the ritual associated with fountain pens – the act of sitting down with a bottle of ink and a crisp piece of paper. Others find calligraphy gives them peace of mind and a type of self-focused attention that’s the antithesis of mindlessly scrolling on our smartphones. One of the most popular pens among stationery nerds is the Lamy Safari, a $40-ish stylus that comes in a rainbow of colours.
Culture radar
NOSTALGIA
Why is the internet romanticizing 2016?
Was 2016 really a simpler time?Photo illustration by The Globe and Mail. Source photos: AP;Getty Images;Netflix;YouTube;AFP/Getty Images/The Globe and Mail
Over the past couple weeks, you may have noticed that your social media feeds have been taken over by decade-old photos, songs, movie clips and memes. It seems like everyone is waxing nostalgia for 2016, the year when the Harambe meme dominated, Pokémon Go was all the rage and Beyoncé released Lemonade. Depending on your age, these cultural touchpoints may not feel so long ago – or they could feel like a bygone era. (My co-worker told me the other day his six-year-old proclaimed “that’s so 2016” as a diss to his wife.)
As Globe culture contributor Sadaf Ahsan wrote this week, 2016 was a cultural hinge-point where everything began to shift. “We didn’t know it at the time, but 2016 was the end of monoculture, of appointment-viewing TV, music releases that felt like events and cultural moments everyone seemed to experience at once.” Read her full analysis here.