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By Hannah Fry, Los Angeles Times (TNS) Every day millions of people share more intimate information with their accessories than they do with their spouse. Wearable technology — smartwatches, smart rings, fitness trackers and the like — monitors body-centric data such as your heart rate, steps taken and calories burned, and may record where you go along the way. Like Santa Claus, it knows when you are sleeping (and how well), it knows when you’re awake, it knows when you’ve been idle or exercising, and it keeps track of all of it. People are also sharing sensitive health information on health and wellness apps , including online mental health and counseling programs. Some women use period tracker apps to map out their monthly cycle. These devices and services have excited consumers hoping for better insight into their health and lifestyle choices. But the lack of oversight into how body-centric data are used and shared with third parties has prompted concerns from privacy experts, who warn that the data could be sold or lost through data breaches, then used to raise insurance premiums, discriminate surreptitiously against applicants for jobs or housing, and even perform surveillance. The use of wearable technology and medical apps surged in the years following the COVID-19 pandemic, but research released by Mozilla on Wednesday indicates that current laws offer little protection for consumers who are often unaware just how much of their health data are being collected and shared by companies. “I’ve been studying the intersections of emerging technologies, data-driven technologies, AI and human rights and social justice for the past 15 years, and since the pandemic I’ve noticed the industry has become hyper-focused on our bodies,” said Mozilla Foundation technology fellow Júlia Keserű, who conducted the research. “That permeates into all kinds of areas of our lives and all kinds of domains within the tech industry.” The report “From Skin to Screen: Bodily Integrity in the Digital Age” recommends that existing data protection laws be clarified to encompass all forms of bodily data. It also calls for expanding national health privacy laws to cover health-related information collected from health apps and fitness trackers and making it easier for users to opt out of body-centric data collections. Researchers have been raising alarms about health data privacy for years. Data collected by companies are often sold to data brokers or groups that buy, sell and trade data from the internet to create detailed consumer profiles. Body-centric data can include information such as the fingerprints used to unlock phones, face scans from facial recognition technology, and data from fitness and fertility trackers, mental health apps and digital medical records. One of the key reasons health information has value to companies — even when the person’s name is not associated with it — is that advertisers can use the data to send targeted ads to groups of people based on certain details they share. The information contained in these consumer profiles is becoming so detailed, however, that when paired with other data sets that include location information, it could be possible to target specific individuals, Keserű said. Location data can “expose sophisticated insights about people’s health status, through their visits to places like hospitals or abortions clinics,” Mozilla’s report said, adding that “companies like Google have been reported to keep such data even after promising to delete it.” A 2023 report by Duke University revealed that data brokers were selling sensitive data on individuals’ mental health conditions on the open market. While many brokers deleted personal identifiers, some provided names and addresses of individuals seeking mental health assistance, according to the report. In two public surveys conducted as part of the research, Keserű said, participants were outraged and felt exploited in scenarios where their health data were sold for a profit without their knowledge. “We need a new approach to our digital interactions that recognizes the fundamental rights of individuals to safeguard their bodily data, an issue that speaks directly to human autonomy and dignity,” Keserű said. “As technology continues to advance, it is critical that our laws and practices evolve to meet the unique challenges of this era.” Consumers often take part in these technologies without fully understanding the implications. Last month, Elon Musk suggested on X that users submit X-rays, PET scans, MRIs and other medical images to Grok, the platform’s artificial intelligence chatbot, to seek diagnoses. The issue alarmed privacy experts, but many X users heeded Musk’s call and submitted health information to the chatbot. While X’s privacy policy says that the company will not sell user data to third parties, it does share some information with certain business partners. Gaps in existing laws have allowed the widespread sharing of biometric and other body-related data. Health information provided to hospitals, doctor’s offices and medical insurance companies is protected from disclosure under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act , known as HIPAA, which established federal standards protecting such information from release without the patient’s consent. But health data collected by many wearable devices and health and wellness apps don’t fall under HIPAA’s umbrella, said Suzanne Bernstein, counsel at Electronic Privacy Information Center. “In the U.S. because we don’t have a comprehensive federal privacy law ... it falls to the state level,” she said. But not every state has weighed in on the issue. Washington, Nevada and Connecticut all recently passed laws to provide safeguards for consumer health data. Washington, D.C., in July introduced legislation that aimed to require tech companies to adhere to strengthened privacy provisions regarding the collection, sharing, use or sale of consumer health data. In California, the California Privacy Rights Act regulates how businesses can use certain types of sensitive information, including biometric information, and requires them to offer consumers the ability to opt out of disclosure of sensitive personal information. “This information being sold or shared with data brokers and other entities hypercharge the online profiling that we’re so used to at this point, and the more sensitive the data, the more sophisticated the profiling can be,” Bernstein said. “A lot of the sharing or selling with third parties is outside the scope of what a consumer would reasonably expect.” Health information has become a prime target for hackers seeking to extort healthcare agencies and individuals after accessing sensitive patient data. Health-related cybersecurity breaches and ransom attacks increased more than 4,000% between 2009 and 2023, targeting the booming market of body-centric data, which is expected to exceed $500 billion by 2030, according to the report. “Nonconsensual data sharing is a big issue,” Keserű said. “Even if it’s biometric data or health data, a lot of the companies are just sharing that data without you knowing, and that is causing a lot of anxiety and questions.” ©2024 Los Angeles Times. Visit at latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.Bill Simmons has witnessed a wide array of NBA stars come and go. In fact, his job allowed him to have a thorough understanding of how aging or the so-called "Father Time" works in the league. As per Simmons, regardless of how athletic, talented, or healthy a player is, there's a certain stage in his career where he would experience a drastic decline. Bill was confident with his homework and concluded that it is physiologically impossible for a player to still perform at such a high level when he reaches this certain stage. However, The Ringer founder made an interesting exception. For Simmons, only Utah Jazz legends Karl Malone and John Stockton had defied his theory. Bill believed that there are a lot of reasons why the Malone-Stockton duo lasted for such a long time but it was also possible that they, especially John, were just genetically different. "Sift through NBA history, and you'll notice that, for modern superstars, The Change occurred somewhere between the 900th and 1,200th career game (including playoffs) for everyone except Karl Malone and John Stockton, who fended it off because of their extraordinary work ethics, their signature play (an unstoppable pick-and-roll that they could have run into their 50s), Utah's altitude (which may have given them a conditioning advantage) and the little-known fact John Stockton is actually an alien," Simmons wrote on ESPN.com in 2011. "An NBA career is really pressure over time: knees are Shawshank's prison wall, games are Andy's rock hammer, and that hammer just keeps chipping away. Eventually, your career gives out. That's the rule," he continued. Bill names a couple of modern NBA stars who beat "Father Time" Aside from Stockton and Malone, Simmons was also in awe of the remarkable ability of certain modern-day NBA players to withstand the conventional limits of aging. He noted that despite reaching an age where most athletes would typically see a dip in performance, superstars such as Kobe Bryant , Ray Allen, and Dirk Nowitzki have unbelievably maintained their high level of play. This phenomenon sparked Simmons' curiosity about the potential factors contributing to such extraordinary longevity in their careers. He alluded to the broader implications of how science and technology are reshaping the landscape of professional sports. For Bill, advancements in medical technology might be a significant reason behind the trend. With innovations in sports medicine, nutrition, and rehabilitation, athletes today have access to resources that previous generations could only dream of. These advancements not only help players recover faster from injuries but also allow them to optimize their physical condition, extending their careers well beyond what was once considered typical. "Or, that was the rule. Because Ray Allen, Paul Pierce, Steve Nash, Dirk Nowitzki, and Kobe Bryant are fending off that rock hammer in ways that have to make us wonder if we're headed for a historical revamping along the lines of the steroids era blowing up baseball like an "Angry Birds" grenade," Simmons pointed out. "Everything we thought we knew about basketball is changing ... and for all the right reasons, too. (Well, unless you're Rashard Lewis and O.J. Mayo.) They are beneficiaries of undeniable advantages over everyone who played before them: better doctors, surgical procedures, dieting, drug testing, trainers, computers, video equipment, workout equipment, workout regiments, airplanes, even pillows are better," he added. Related: Ice Cube shares his struggles watching Larry Bird dominate: "I just couldn't understand how he was as good as he was" Other legends dwindle overnight While there are NBA stars who age like fine wine, Simmons noted that there were also those who quickly faded away to obscurity. As per Bill, among them was the great Julius Erving . As a die-hard Boston Celtics fan, Simmons said he was during the infamous in-game fight between Larry Bird and "Dr. J." At the time, Bill said it made so many headlines that some people thought Erving was still on the same level or even greater than Bird but the truth is he wasn't. Simmons articulates that Erving's dwindling was notably swift. The way he saw it, "Dr. J" was once celebrated for his athleticism and dominance on the court, but it was like he abruptly transitioned into a famous athlete with mediocre skills. "Bird outscored Erving 42-6 in three quarters before words were exchanged and, incredibly, two of the league's biggest stars started fighting at midcourt. Their scuffle was so preposterous that it overshadowed the real story: Julius Erving had gone through The Change. He was great, and then he wasn't. And it happened overnight," Simmons said. In conclusion, the transformation that NBA stars go through as they reach "Father Time" serves as a poignant reminder of the fleeting nature of athletic greatness and the challenges that come with aging in competitive sports. Simmons' insights on the matter helped us better understand how quickly even the most exceptional athletes can face a decline, how genetics and discipline could slow it down, and how science and innovation sometimes alter their natural course. Related: Karl Malone on getting used to John Stockton's excellence: "He's so good, you begin to take him for granted"
A tattoed motorcycle gang member who planted a pipe bomb under a rival's father's van amid an ongoing feud was jailed today for nine years. Daniel Laponder, 43, targeted David Rollo senior's work van outside his home in Lennoxtown, East Dunbartonshire, on June 8, 2024. Mr Rollo's son is a member of the Blue Angels Motorcycle Club - stated to be the oldest "outlaw" biker club in Europe. Groundworker Laponder is an ex-member of the Blue Angels who subsequently formed his own Mad Dogs Motorcycle Club after he left. The High Court in Glasgow was told that the two rival clubs were "engaged in a feud" with each other. Laponder was later snared with a shotgun which he kept on his barge where he resided in Kirkintilloch, East Dunbartonshire. Laponder pled guilty in September to wilful fire-raising and possession of the shotgun without the authority of the Secretary of State or Scottish Ministers. Judge Lord Arthurson told Laponder at today's sentencing that the background to the offences was "somewhat bizarre stemming from a feud between the Blue Angels and Mad Dogs after you left the Blue Angels." The judge added: "A very substantial custodial disposal is inevitable in this case." The earlier hearing was told Mr Rollo senior parked his BT Openreach Vauxhall Vivaro van near his home on June 7, 2024. Late the following night, an off-duty firefighter was told of a vehicle which was ablaze on Benvue Road. Prosecutor Lorraine Glancy KC said: "He attended to assess the situation and saw the vehicle on fire. "He observed a device made up of bottles, wires and an apparent electrical component with a battery compartment." Fire crews attended and found a device lying underneath the front of the van. It was stated that this consisted of two plastic bottles and copper pipe taped together, attached to an RF receiver with an antenna. A major incident was later declared which resulted in an emergency evacuation procedure as well as a 100-metre cordon until the device was made safe. Due to the nature and severity of the incident, teams from Police Scotland , Scottish Fire and Rescue, the Scottish Ambulance Service and a Royal Navy Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit attended. READ NEXT: Paedophile who abused two young boys in Glasgow dies behind bars Miss Glancy said: "At 5.45am, confirmation was received that the device was a viable pipe bomb which had been detonated "There were traces of accelerant located at the front offside wheel and an area underneath the engine." Police inquiries led officers to the Mad Dogs Motorcycle Club Facebook account which featured Laponder and another man with a Range Rover. The same Range Rover was caught on video doorbell footage as the vehicle driven by the perpetrators. The pair even posted themselves on Facebook on the day of the attack with the caption "Hooked up with this reprobate today, interesting stuff." Laponder and the other man purchased duct tape and a bottle of water which were identical to those used in the making of the bomb. Laponder's DNA and fingerprints were also recovered from the bottles and tape. A forensic investigation on the device found that it comprised of petrol and ball bearings with a remote activation attached to it. Police traced Laponder on July 3 and he informed them that there was a shotgun in his Kirkintilloch barge. The weapon was recovered and found to be a loaded side-by-side, double barrel, break-action shotgun designed to discharge 12-bore shotgun cartridges. The gun had been shortened by removing a section of the barrels and stock. Other items recovered included wires and connectors similar to items recovered from the bomb incident. When quizzed by officers, Laponder stated: "I'm not a Blue Angel anymore, I retired a year ago." Laponder was asked about the bomb and replied: "Link the dots, we've been getting attacked all the time. "What is a remote detonator? It goes off with a remote, perhaps it was a shot across the bow." A garage linked to the Mad Dogs Motorcycle Club was raided and two remote firing systems similar to the one used in the bomb attack were recovered. John Scullion KC, defending, told the sentencing that there had been targeted attacks by the rival gang in the months leading up the the events. The advocate added: "He said it was his intention to end the feud by retaliating to those involved in the previous incidents. "He accepts full responsibility for his actions and he bitterly regrets his involvement in the offences. "He expresses remorse which appears genuine and has insight on the impact the offences have had on his family as well as the wider community." It was revealed that Laponder's previous convictions include one for violence in England as well as road traffic matters which included a drunk driving matter in 2022 where he was fined £2,000 and disqualified for 20 months.It shouldn’t be all about the Young Avengers. We may have to wait a few more years to see the new iteration of the Avengers , but that’s nothing compared to the anticipation for Marvel’s next generation of superheroes. Fans have been holding out for the arrival of a beloved super-team, the Young Avengers, for what’s felt like ages now. And Marvel certainly isn’t ignorant to that anticipation: Recent Marvel projects have been hard at work introducing prospective members, from Hawkeye’ s Kate Bishop to The Falcon and the Winter Soldier’ s Eli Bradley. A new attraction on Disney’s latest cruise ship, the Treasure, is even teasing a future team-up between young heroes like Cassie Lang, America Chavez, and Riri Williams. And perhaps most crucially, Ms. Marvel was last seen recruiting members for a new superhero group. Marvel’s Cinematic Universe is clearly ready to introduce the Young Avengers in earnest. There’s just one problem: not all of those aforementioned heroes belong on the Young Avengers team. The Young Avengers are a popular group within Marvel comics, initially designed to spotlight the new wave of Avengers sidekicks. Many of the members serve as “successors” to well-known Marvel heroes, but it’s important to note that they’re not the only next-gen team kicking around in the Marvel Universe. While the Young Avengers are a sanctioned off-shoot of the traditional Avengers, there are also groups like the Champions, who made the conscious choice to stand apart. The Champions’ founding members — Ms. Marvel (Kamala Khan), Spider-Man (Miles Morales), and Nova (Sam Alexander) — were once members of the “new” Avengers, fighting alongside seasoned heroes like Captain America and Iron Man. After the events of Civil War II , however, Ms. Marvel became disillusioned with the Avengers and their disregard for collateral damage. She set out to form a new team with the goal of actually changing the world, not just saving it. “We wanted these kids to see themselves as agents of change,” writer Mark Waid told Inverse in 2023. “There were plenty of other super groups out there whose job was to fight the Toad and Mr. Hyde and Magneto. We wanted them to have a distinct goal, and social change was right there in front of us.” The Champions were founded with a purpose, and it’s one that future Marvel projects need to honor. The Champion’s early missions were a refreshing alternative to the ambitious, often mystic, scope of the Young Avengers storylines. Where the latter team isn’t often concerned with legacy, the Champions actively confront what it means to be a hero in a shifting world. They brought something new and much-needed to the Marvel Universe — and though members of the Champions already exist in the MCU, there’s a sense that they’ll be joining the Young Avengers rather than forming their own team. After The Marvels , Kamala Khan has been positioned as a potential leader of the Young Avengers. That’s not too dissimilar to her arc in the comics, and it makes sense that she’d be forming her own group sooner than later. Still, relegating her to the Young Avengers and not the Champions just feels like a mistake. The two teams aren’t interchangeable, and slotting certain characters into the prospective line-up (like Riri Williams, a longtime member of the Champions) just feels disingenuous. Not only could Marvel be wasting an opportunity to introduce some true tension to Kamala’s superhero journey, but it could be abandoning a major aspect of films like Avengers: Age of Ultron or Captain America: Civil War , which constantly interrogated the Avengers and their legacy. It may be too soon to express concern about Marvel’s future plans, especially since the studio hasn’t made an official announcement about Young Avengers or Champions. That said, conflating the two groups isn’t a great strategy. They’re two sides of one coin, and there’s no reason they can’t both exist in the MCU. Movies Superheroes Marvel Universe
Trump’s promises to conservatives raise fears of more book bans in USNoneThe national furor in recent years around on race and gender in public schools is intensifying as President-elect Donald Trump threatens to shut down the Department of Education, emboldening conservatives to end “wokeness” in classrooms. Battles over books in have become emblematic of the country’s larger culture wars over race, historical revisionism and gender identity. A found book bans increased by nearly 200% during the 2023-24 school year, including titles on sexuality, substance abuse, depression and other issues students face in an age of accelerating technologies, climate change, toxic politics and fears about the future. Book censorship has shaken and divided school boards, pitted parents against parents, and led to . It is part of an agenda driven by conservative parental rights groups and politicians who promote and voucher systems that could weaken public education. The issue goes to the heart not only of what students are taught but how federal and state education policies will affect the nation’s politics after one of the most consequential elections in its history. “It’s not just about taking a book off a shelf,” said Tasslyn Magnusson, an author and teacher from Wisconsin who tracks book censorship across the U.S. “It’s about power and who controls public education. It’s about what kind of America we were and are. We’re trying to define what family is and what America means. That comes down to the stories we tell.” She said she feared Trump’s return to the White House would further incite those calling for book bans: “I don’t have lots of hope. It could get a lot worse.” Over the last year, PEN counted more than 10,000 book bans nationwide that targeted 4,231 unique titles. Most were books dealing with gender, sexuality, race and LGBTQ+ storylines. The most banned title was about a school shooting that included a short description of date rape. Florida and Iowa — both of which have strict regulations on what students can read — accounted for more than 8,200 bans in the 2023-24 school year. “This crisis is tragic for young people hungry to understand the world they live in and see their identities and experiences reflected in books,” Kasey Meehan, director of PEN’s Freedom to Read Program, said in a statement. “What students can read in schools provides the foundation for their lives.” Trump’s calls to close the would need congressional approval, which appears unlikely. Although public schools are largely funded and governed by state and local institutions, the department helps pay to educate students with disabilities, provides about $18 billion in grants for K-12 schools in poor communities and oversees a civil rights branch to protect students from discrimination. But Trump’s election has inspired conservative parental groups, including Moms For Liberty and Parents Defending Education, to strengthen efforts to limit what they see as a liberal conspiracy to indoctrinate children with books and teachings that are perverse, amoral and pornographic. Tiffany Justice, co-founder of Moms for Liberty, has criticized schools that she says spend too much time on diversity and inclusion when only about one-third of U.S. children are reading at grade level: “We’re talking about public school libraries and content for kids,” Justice told NewsNation after Trump’s victory. “I think it’s very clear that there are certain things that are appropriate for kids, certain things that are appropriate for adults. We’re just getting back to commonsense America.” Trump’s threat to to schools that acknowledge transgender identities could affect curricula and the kinds of books school libraries stock. During his rally at Madison Square Garden in October, Trump — who has has accused schools of promoting sex change operations — said his administration would get “transgender insanity the hell out of our schools.” Vice President-elect JD Vance has accused Democrats of wanting to “put sexually explicit books in toddlers’ libraries.” Nicole Neily, president of Parents Defending Education, told Newsmax that she was excited about Trump’s calls to remake education and “clean up a lot of the mess” he has inherited from the Biden administration. Trump “has centered parental rights back in his platform, which is incredible. He has prioritized knowledge and skill, not identity politics,” she said. “American children deserve better, and it is time for change.” In nominating to be his secretary of Education, Trump appears to be pushing for more conservative parental control over what is taught and read in classrooms. A former professional wrestling executive, McMahon chairs the America First Policy Institute, a Trump-connected organization that has criticized schools for teaching “racially divisive” theories, notably about slavery and a perspective about the nation’s founding it views as anti-American. “Today’s contentious debates over using classrooms for political activism rather than teaching a complete and accurate account of American history have reinvigorated calls for greater parental and citizen involvement in the curriculum approval process,” the institute’s website says. Culturally divisive issues, including race and LGBTQ+ themes, cost school districts an estimated $3.2 billion during the 2023-24 school year, according to a recent study called The survey — published by the Institute for Democracy, Education and Access at UCLA — found that battles over books and teaching about sexuality and other topics led to increased expenses for legal fees, replacing administrators and teachers who quit, and security, including off-duty plainclothes police officers. “Are we really going to spend our tax dollars on these kinds of things?” asked Magnusson. “After Trump was elected, I saw a bunch of middle-class white ladies like me who were saying, ‘This isn’t America.’ But maybe it is America.” One school superintendent in a Western state told the study’s researchers that his staff was often consumed with correcting misinformation and fulfilling public record requests mainly from hard-line parental rights activists attempting to exploit cultural war issues to discredit the district. “Our staff are spending enormous amounts of time just doing stupid stuff,” the superintendent said. “The fiscal costs to the district are enormous, but [so are] the cultural costs of not standing up to the extremists. If someone doesn’t, then the students and employees lose. ... It’s the worst it’s ever been.” The survey found that 29% of 467 school superintendents interviewed reported that teachers and other staff quit their profession or left their districts “due to culturally divisive conflict.” Censoring books in school libraries grew out of opposition to COVID-19 restrictions. A number of conservative parental groups, including Moms for Liberty, which invited Trump to speak at its national convention in August, turned their attention to lobbying against “liberal indoctrination.” Their protests against what they criticized as progressive teaching on sexuality and race were focused on increasing conservative parental control over a public education system that was That strategy has led to a national, right-wing effort that is “redefining government power to restrict access to information in our schools,” said Stephana Ferrell, co-founder of the Florida Freedom to Read Project. “This movement to protect the innocence of our children believes if children never read it in a book they won’t have to know about it and can go on to lead harmonious lives. But books teach us cautionary tales. They instruct us. You can’t protect innocence through ignorance.” School districts across the country have removed “Gender Queer” by Maia Kobabe and “All Boys Aren’t Blue” by George Johnson, which are about gender identity and include graphic depictions of sex, along with titles by renowned writers such as Toni Morrison, Kurt Vonnegut, George Orwell, Maya Angelou and Flannery O’Connor. Related Articles Surveys show that most Americans do not favor censorship. The Florida Freedom to Read Project and similar organizations around the country have called for thorough public reviews of challenged books to prevent one scene or passage from being taken out of context. Moderate and liberal parents groups over the last two years have also become more active in school board politics. They have supported school board candidates who have defeated those backed by Moms for Liberty in Texas, Florida and other states. “People say the pendulum will swing back,” said Ferrell. But, she said, conservatives want to “stop the pendulum from swinging back.” Picoult is accustomed to conservatives attempting to censor her. Her books have been banned in schools in more than 30 states. Published in 2007, “Nineteen Minutes” explores the lives of characters, including a girl who was raped, in a town leading up to a school shooting and its aftermath. “Having the most banned book in the country is not a badge of honor. It’s a call for alarm,” said Picoult, whose books have sold more than 40 million copies. “My book, and the 10,000 others that have been pulled off school library shelves this year, give kids a tool to deal with an increasingly divided and difficult world. These book banners aren’t helping children. They are harming them.” ©2024 Los Angeles Times. Visit at latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.