Public Infrastructure, tech & Democracy
Governments procure technologies with hidden carceral and exclusionary consequences—algorithms that limit eligibility for public services, cameras that surveil workers and protestors, and policing tools embedded in public utilities. Policing interests are often foregrounded, and corporations benefit from a lack of regulation, transparency, or accountability. We develop creative interventions to grow democratic governance. We center sites for well-being where technology is shifting the balance of power, such as schools and hospitals, and tools central to governance such as IDs, financial inclusion, and public benefits.
- Testimony: NYC AI and ADS Decision Making Systems NYC Technology Committee October 2024
- Testimony: Challenge Based Procurement Reform August 2024
- Report: MyCity, Inc.: A Case Against CompStat Urbanism
- Report: Smart-City Digital ID Projects: Reinforcing Inequality and Increasing Surveillance through Corporate ‘Solutions’
- Campaign to Preserve the IDNYC
- Testimony: To NYC City Council on LinkNYC
Mobile Driver’s Licenses
Digital driver’s licenses (dDL) are quietly and rapidly remaking how identification functions in the United States. dDLs, a “smart city” technology, are promoted as providing functions that physical licenses do not. This includes signing up for social services, utility assistance, tax refunds, opening bank accounts, buying products online or accessing age-restricted content (due to the adoption of online age verification laws in several states). Along with digital wallets and the push to end cash, dDLs facilitate widespread state and corporate surveillance.
- Community Guide: Mobile Driver’s Licenses and the Costs to Privacy, Safety, and Security
- Webinar Recording: Mobile Driver’s Licenses and the Costs to Privacy, Safety, and Security
- State mDL mapping
- Comment on DHS and TSA Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on mDLs
- Community FAQs: Understanding the Risks of Digital IDs
- IDNYC Factsheet
Transnational Migration Control
We bring a global lens to our work, and build transnational collaborative networks and learning circles. The Lab is anchoring The Everywhere Border pilot project along with R3D (el Red en Defensa de los Derechos Digitales, based in Mexico) and the Temple University Institute for Law, Innovation & Technology (iLIT) to build a transnational network to combat the harms of the digital infrastructures of control. This work includes building with human rights monitors and organizations in Mexico, Central and South America, and the Caribbean.