Tag: 1st amendment

AI Fraud Act Could Outlaw Parodies, Political Cartoons, and More

Mixing new technology and new laws is always a fraught business, especially if the tech in question relates to communication. Lawmakers routinely propose bills that would sweep up all sorts of First Amendment-protected speech. We’ve seen a lot of this with social media, and we’re starting to see it with artificial intelligence. Case in point: the No Artificial Intelligence Fake Replicas And Unauthorized Duplications (No AI FRAUD) Act. Under the auspices of protecting “Americans’ individual right to their likeness and voice,” the bill would restrict a range of content wide enough to ensnare parody videos, comedic impressions, political cartoons, and much more.

The bill’s sponsors, Reps. María Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.) and Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.), say they’re concerned about “AI-generated fakes and forgeries,” per a press release. They aim to protect people from unauthorized use of their own images and voices by defining these things as the intellectual property of each individual.

The No AI Fraud Act cites several instances of AI being used to make it appear that celebrities created ads or art that they did not actually create. For instance, “AI technology was used to create the song titled ‘Heart on My Sleeve,’ emulating the voices of recording artists Drake and The Weeknd,” states the bill’s text. AI technology was also used “to create a false endorsement featuring Tom Hanks’ face in an advertisement for a dental plan.”

But while the examples in the bill are directly related to AI, the bill’s actual reach is much more expansive, targeting a wide swath of “digital depictions” or “digital voice replicas.”

Salazar and Dean say the bill balances people’s “right to control the use of their identifying characteristics” with “First Amendment protections to safeguard speech and innovation.” But while the measure does nod to free speech rights, it also expands the types of speech deemed legally acceptable to restrict. It could mean way more legal hassles for creators and platforms interested in exercising their First Amendment rights, and result in a chilling effect on certain sorts of comedy, commentary, and artistic expression.

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Reddit must share IP addresses of piracy-discussing users, film studios say

For the third time in less than a year, film studios with copyright infringement complaints against a cable Internet provider are trying to force Reddit to share information about users who have discussed piracy on the site.

In 2023, film companies lost two attempts to have Reddit unmask its users. In the first instance, US Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler ruled in the US District Court for the Northern District of California that the First Amendment right to anonymous speech meant Reddit didn’t have to disclose the names, email addresses, and other account registration information for nine Reddit users. Film companies, including Bodyguard Productions and Millennium Media, had subpoenaed Reddit in relation to a copyright infringement lawsuit against Astound Broadband-owned RCN about subscribers allegedly pirating 34 movie titles, including Hellboy (2019), Rambo V: Last Blood, and Tesla.

In the second instance, the same companies sued Astound Broadband-owned ISP Grande, again for alleged copyright infringement occurring over the ISP’s network. The studios subpoenaed Reddit for user account information, including “IP address registration and logs from 1/1/2016 to present, name, email address, and other account registration information” for six Reddit users, per a July 2023 court filing.

In August, a federal court again quashed that subpoena, citing First Amendment rights. In her ruling, Beeler noted that while the First Amendment right to anonymous speech is not absolute, the film producers had already received the names of 118 Grande subscribers. She also said the film producers had failed to prove that “the identifying information is directly or materially relevant or unavailable from another source.”

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AI Watermarking Is Advocated by Biden’s Advisory Committee Member, Raising Concerns for Parody and Memes

The Biden administration doesn’t seem quite certain how to do it – but it would clearly like to see AI watermarking implemented as soon as possible, despite the idea being marred by many misgivings.

And, even despite what some reports admit is a lack of consensus on “what digital watermark is.” Standards and enforcement regulation are also missing. As has become customary, where the government is constrained or insufficiently competent, it effectively enlists private companies.

With the standards problem, these seem to none other than tech dinosaur Adobe, and China’s TikTok.

It’s hardly a conspiracy theory to think the push mostly has to do with the US presidential election later this year, as watermarking of this kind can be “converted” from its original stated purpose – into a speech-suppression tool.

The publicly presented argument in favor is obviously not quite that, although one can read between the lines. Namely – AI watermarking is promoted as a “key component” in combating misinformation, deepfakes included.

And this is where perfectly legal and legitimate genres like parody and memes could suffer from AI watermarking-facilitated censorship.

Spearheading the drive, such as it is, is Biden’s National Artificial Intelligence Advisory Committee and now one of its members, Carnegie Mellon University’s Ramayya Krishnan, admits there are “enforcement issues” – but is still enthusiastic about the possibility of using technology that “labels how content was made.”

From the Committee’s point of view, a companion AI tool would be a cherry on top.

However, there’s still no actual cake. Different companies are developing watermarking which can be put in three categories: visible, invisible (i.e., visible only to algorithms), and based on cryptographic metadata.

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Biden Is Overseeing the Silent Death of the First Amendment

In early 2024, a new, grim chapter may be written in the annals of journalistic history. Julian Assange, the publisher of Wikileaks, could board a plane for extradition to the United States, where he faces up to 175 years in prison on espionage charges for the crime of publishing newsworthy information.

The persecution of Assange is clear evidence that the Biden administration is overseeing the silent death of the First Amendment—with global consequences.

Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein’s exposé during the Watergate scandal is seen as a triumph of truth over power. Their investigative reporting led to the downfall of President Nixon, cementing their status as champions of press freedom. However, what if this tale had taken a dark turn, with the journalists prosecuted for espionage and silenced under the guise of national security? While this is mere fiction, Assange’s plight is all too real.

Assange, the standard-bearer of our era’s investigative journalism, awaits extradition in a British cell in Belmarsh Prison, a fate that could stifle the beacon of transparency he represents. At a time when the world grapples with the erosion of press freedom, with journalists imprisoned and killed, Assange’s case raises profound questions about the consequences of challenging power and unveiling uncomfortable realities.

The legacy of WikiLeaks goes beyond exposing government misconduct; it pierces the veil of secrecy shrouding global affairs. The release of Collateral Murder, the haunting camera footage from a 2007 Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad showing the murder of several civilians, including two Reuters journalists, shocked the world. As we’ve seen in the past two months, the killing of civilians and journalists in war continues. In the last two months, Israel’s bombardment of Gaza has killed dozens of journalists, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. On Thursday, human rights groups determined that Israel had deliberately fired on a Reuters journalist in southern Lebanon—a blatant war crime.

The aim of targeting journalists is to keep information where governments want it—under lock and key. That is why Wikileaks is such a threat—because, since its founding, it has fearlessly worked to wrest that information out of the hands of the powerful and put it in the hands of the people.

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October 7: A Turning Point for Free Speech?

Two hundred and forty-seven years ago last week, General George Washington rallied his beleaguered troops at Valley Forge with a public reading of Thomas Paine’s The American Crisis, which reminded them, “These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country.” Where is Paine now when we need him?

Freedom of speech on American college campuses is now facing great challenges in the aftermath of the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel and Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. According to some, the outpouring of ugly, inexplicable, and vituperative speech unleashed by these events means that now is the time to abandon the concept of free speech at our universities. Apparently, to these “sunshine constitutional scholars,” speech can only be free if it is polite and unchallenging.

Without a doubt, the past two and a half months have been a complete shitshow: clueless students excusing butchery and war crimes; feckless university presidents whose past records exhibit little concern for First Amendment limits now invoking the need to protect free expression; and opportunistic politicians who seemingly lack any understanding of constitutional constraints grandstanding their way through the misery and trying to impose plainly unconstitutional restrictions on student speech.

The campus reactions were kicked off with an October open letter from the Harvard Graduate Students for Palestine and the Palestine Solidarity Committee, which began: “We, the undersigned student organizations, hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence.” That opening salvo presaged a tsunami of impassioned rhetoric from all sides of the conflict, with some pro-Palestinian groups praising the October 7 invaders as “martyrs” and chanting slogans like “from the river to the sea Palestine will be free” and “by any means necessary.” Others, justifiably horrified at the hostage taking and the atrocities committed in the October attack, responded with harsh rhetoric of their own, sometimes blurring the distinction between condemning the terrorist organization Hamas and attacking all Palestinians. 

In this toxic atmosphere, clashes on campus and in the streets have brought to the surface many repulsive ideas, and some actions that go beyond the “uninhibited, robust, and wide-open” debate which “may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks” that the First Amendment protects. For example, police arrested a Cornell University student for allegedly authoring online posts threatening Jewish students that included the claim he would “bring an assault rifle to campus and shoot all you pig jews.” Some pro-Palestinian activists ripped down posters with pictures of hostages held by Hamas. In November, three young Palestinian men were shot and injured near the University of Vermont, an incident federal authorities are investigating as a possible hate crime.

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Federal Lawsuit Challenges Mississippi’s Ban On Marijuana Advertising, Citing Free-Speech Rights

Mississippi’s medical cannabis advertising ban is preventing a small dispensary from attracting customers, Tru Source owner Clarence Cocroft is arguing in a federal lawsuit that casts the law as a violation of his free-speech rights.

Though medical marijuana is now legal for Mississippians with qualifying conditions and a medical cannabis card, state law prohibits dispensary owners and cultivators from advertising cannabis products.

“It’s a daunting task to stay in the industry when you can’t advertise,” Cocroft told the Mississippi Free Press on December 8. “And it’s legal. If they allow you to get licensed, they should allow you to promote your business.”

Cocroft owns Tru Source, the state’s first Black-owned medical cannabis dispensary, located in the southeast industrial zoning area of Olive Branch, Mississippi. Cocroft and his dispensary filed a lawsuit on November 14 against the officials in charge of the regulations at the Mississippi State Department of Health, the Mississippi Department of Revenue and the Mississippi Alcohol Beverage Control Bureau.

To open a medical cannabis shop in the state, a person must apply for a dispensary license, register for a sales tax permit and pay thousands of dollars in fees. A person must have a medical cannabis card and be over the age of 21 to enter a dispensary.

“The fight was, ‘OK, we’re paying you all a lot of taxes. We’re abiding by all your rules that you have set forth. All we’re asking is simple: Allow us to advertise. It’s going to increase your tax rate as a state,’” Cocroft said.

Tru Source relies on its website, word of mouth and signs posted on the building for advertising. But Cocroft cannot advertise his dispensary or its website in any other advertising medium. The owner said many customers would not have known about the store if they had not driven by the area.

“It’s not just me in my location that cannot advertise,” he said. “It’s every location in Olive Branch; it’s every dispensary in DeSoto County and all 82 counties,” Cocroft said.

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Federal Judge Rejects Press Freedom Claims By Project Veritas In Ashley Biden Diary Case

A federal judge in Manhattan has ruled that investigative journalism outfit Project Veritas should have to turn over documents detailing how the organization came into possession of the alleged diary of President Joe Biden’s daughter, Ashley Biden.

On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres of the Southern District of New York ruled in favor of a special master’s recommendation that Project Veritas should be made to turn over all documents in its possession that detail how it came into possession of the diary in the fall of 2020. Judge Torres ruled against claims by Project Veritas that it has journalistic non-disclosure privileges under the First Amendment and thus should not be made to turn over its records.

With Judge Torres’s ruling, federal prosecutors could soon take possession of more than 900 documents detailing how Project Veritas came into possession of the diary. Judge Torres ordered a government evidentiary filter team to sort out any documents not protected under attorney-client privilege and turn those documents over to government investigators by Jan. 5.

The legal battle over Ms. Biden’s alleged diary began in the fall of 2021, when federal agents carried out search warrants at the homes of several Project Veritas employees, including the group’s founder and then-CEO James O’Keefe. Project Veritas has asserted that federal investigators should be compelled to return records seized from the organization, arguing that the records seizure violated their First Amendment rights as a press organization.

Project Veritas had specifically argued that past legal precedents had protected news organizations from liability for publishing information, even when said information was acquired illegally by an intermediary. Judge Torres, an appointee of President Barack Obama, ruled that such precedents don’t protect Project Veritas in this case because federal prosecutors are treating the press organization as an active participant in the theft of Ms. Biden’s alleged diary, rather than a simple recipient of unlawfully obtained information.

“The Supreme Court held that the First Amendment protects the publication of information by a ‘law-abiding possessor of information,’ even if the publisher received the information from a source who obtained it unlawfully,” Judge Torres wrote. “Here, the Government is investigating whether [Project Veritas and its members] participated in the theft of the Victim’s journal and the other items.”

Ms. Biden’s alleged diary was discovered by defendants Aimee Harris and Robert Kurlander. Without naming Ms. Biden specifically, federal charging documents state “an immediate family member of a then-former government official who was a candidate for national political office” had stored the diary at a private residence in Delray Beach, Florida.

Project Veritas has contended that it received the diary through a pair of tipsters, whom they referred to as A.H. and R.K., who approached the organization. Project Veritas further asserted that the diary was not stolen, but simply abandoned by Ms. Biden and subsequently found by their tipsters.

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Video Shows Vermont State Trooper Arrest Man for Flipping Him Off

Newly released video footage shows a Vermont state trooper arresting a man on disorderly conduct charges for the First Amendment–protected activity of flipping him off.

The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), a First Amendment advocacy group, released dashcam footage today showing the 2018 arrest of Gregory Bombard, who is pursuing a lawsuit alleging his free speech rights were violated by the arrest.

Bombard was driving through his hometown of St. Albans, Vermont, on February 9, 2018, when he was pulled over by Vermont State Trooper Jay Riggen. 

Riggen accused Bombard of giving him the finger. Bombard denied it, but he was incensed about being pulled over for such a trivial matter. “That would be considered freedom of expression, so I’m going to file a complaint against you,” Bombard said.

“And you’re more than welcome to,” Riggen responded. “So here’s the issue: Although it may be freedom of expression, it’s so unusual that it requires intervention to make sure you don’t need help of some kind.”

As Bombard’s lawsuit explains, Riggen’s reasoning was legally deficient. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, which covers Vermont, held in 2013 that the middle finger’s “nearly universal recognition” as an insult made it unreasonable for an officer to interpret it as a distress signal.

Bombard tried to continue the conversation, but Riggen concluded the traffic stop and walked back to his car. Bombard was not content, however. As Bombard pulled away, he actually did flip Riggen off.

“It looks like as he pulled away he called me an asshole and said, ‘Fuck you,'” Riggen relayed into his radio. “Flipped the bird. I’m going to arrest him for disorderly conduct. There were multiple people around there.”

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New York lawmakers introduce bill to force Chick-Fil-A restaurants along highway to stay open on Sundays

Yes, New York apparently cares more about travelers and their munchies than they do about religious freedom — or freedom at all, for that matter. Chick-Fil-A closes on the Lord’s Day to give employees a holy day of rest, but it looks like they could be faced with a big-time decision in their New York State rest stop locations — whether to stay and remain open on Sunday, or to simply move out.

It’s the holiday season, meaning thousands of drivers will be on the road, and now a group of New York State Assembly officials want to ensure all travelers can access all restaurants…seven days a week. News10 spoke with one of the sponsors of the Rest Stop Restaurant Act, Assemblyman Tony Simone …

The bill will require companies contracted to provide food and beverage services along the Thruway and at the Port Authority in New York and New Jersey to remain open seven days a week.

That means Chick-Fil-A, in locations at rest stops along this highway system, would be forced to stay open on Sundays.

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BARRING SPEAKERS UNDER U.S. SANCTIONS PUTS IDEAS OFF-LIMITS, SAY FREE SPEECH ADVOCATES

A LAWSUIT FILED Wednesday says the U.S. government violated the First Amendment when it prevented a U.S.-based organization from hosting people sanctioned by the U.S. as speakers at a conference earlier this year. The suit, if successful, could have far-reaching implications for placing federal limits on freedom of speech when sanctioned or otherwise designated people or groups are involved.

The complaint, filed by Columbia University’s Knight First Amendment Institute, argues that the decision made by the Office of Foreign Assets Control could have consequences for public discourse, including whether news outlets could publish interviews with individuals designated under U.S. sanctions law.

For the lawyers bringing the suit, the current curtailment of speech based on sanctions amounts to the policing of thought. 

“The question at the core of the case is what control the U.S. government has over the American mind and whether it can effectively insulate Americans from ideas and people who it decides are off-limits,” said Alex Abdo, litigation director of the Knight Institute. “That is an extraordinarily dangerous authority.”

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