Jasmine McNealy Authors Book Chapter on Consent and Data Protection Regulation

Jasmine McNealy, University of Florida College of Journalism and Communications Media Production, Management, and Technology associate professor, is the author of “Consent (Still) Won’t Save Us,” a chapter in the book Feminist Cyberlaw to be published by University of California Press.

In the chapter, McNealy focuses on content. She considers the boundaries of consent and the limitations on the continued use of information control as the grounding for data protection regulation, especially with the accelerated use of artificial intelligence and algorithmic decision systems.

McNealy reviews consent as both contextual and sociotechnical as well as the boundaries to be observed. She references a famous facial recognition lawsuit settlement by Clearview AI. The company collected and stored data, but also sold access to its voluminous database to many organizations including government and corporate entities.

“The Clearview case demonstrates that even accepted bounds of consent in agreeing to the terms of use for a social media site are not enough to prevent the use and access of personal data by third parties. This should provide further evidence that consent or notice and choice are normative legal constructs that do not provide the kinds of data protection that individuals need against ever emerging ways of collecting, using, and exploiting personal data.”

“Although individual choice is important as a general matter, it does not stop organizations and organizational tools from interacting with personal data in ways that cross personal boundaries,” writes McNealy. “What’s needed, instead, is the institution of a regulatory framework that prohibits certain data collection and sharing at the outset of any human–organization or human–machine interaction. Such a framework would assist individuals from being left without recourse if they had offered a measure of consent. Instead, this kind of framework would preclude certain business models and shut off certain kinds of data interactions.”

Posted: June 5, 2024
Category: College News
Tagged as: Consent, Data Protection, Feminist Cyberlaw, Jasmine McNealy, MPMT