Episode 19: Technology, the Law and You

The growth of technology has always been part of the human story, since the invention of tools and eventually the wheel. Technology is what has allowed our civilization to evolve, address challenges, and improve daily life.

In recent history, computer technology has grown exponentially, allowing the average person to achieve tasks that our grandmothers and grandfathers could only dream of – GPS applications alone have allowed those of us who are “navigationally challenged” to explore the world around us with relative ease!

With that growth comes the need for government to make sure that technology is being used responsibly and isn’t causing undo harm. In the United States, and specifically in New York State, legislation has evolved in-step with technology, from safety regulations in factories to traffic safety laws to data privacy protection.

On this episode, Valerie Lubanko, Deputy General Counsel, and Matthew Miller, Director of Policy and Legislation, will discuss some legislation in the world of information technology and data privacy, including how it could impact New Yorkers.

Thank you for listening to the IT’S a Tech Podcast. For more information about ITS, visit our website at its.ny.gov. Follow us on X, LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook.

Transcript

 0:01
 You're listening to the IT'S a Tech Podcast, an engaging conversation about the game-changing technology solutions being advanced by the state's Office of Information Technology Services.

 0:12
 Learn how ITS makes IT happen

 0:15
 for more than 50 state agencies and over 20 million New Yorkers. The growth of technology has always been a part of the human story.

 0:25
 Since the invention of tools and eventually the wheel, technology is what has allowed our civilization to evolve, address challenges, and improve daily life.

 0:35
 In recent history, computer technology has grown exponentially, allowing the average person to achieve tasks that our grandmothers and grandfathers could only dream of.

 0:43
 GPS applications alone have allowed those of us who are "navigationally challenged" to explore the world around us with relative ease.

 0:51
 With that growth comes the need for government to make sure that technology is being used responsibly and isn't causing undue harm.

 0:59
 In the United States, and specifically in New York State, legislation has evolved in step with technology, from safety regulations in factories to traffic safety laws to data privacy protection.

 1:12
 On today's episode, Valerie Lubanko, Deputy General Counsel, and Matthew Miller, Director of Policy and Legislation, will discuss some legislation in the world of information technology and data privacy, including how it could impact New Yorkers.

 1:27
 Val, Matt, thank you so much for coming today and sharing your knowledge and insight on this important topic.

 1:34
 However, let's start by talking about you.

 1:37
 How did you come to your positions at ITS and what are your main areas of focus?

 1:41
 Val, why don't we start with you?

 1:43
 Yes, I'm so excited to be here.

 1:46
 This is my first podcast, so I'm very excited.

 1:48
 Welcome.

 1:50
 I started working for the state in 2017.

 1:53
 I was the FOIL Council for the Executive Chamber and then I was assistant counsel to the Governor starting in 2020.

 2:03
 And as we all know that was a very interesting time for technology, and ITS was in my portfolio and I got to know Marcy Stevens, the Chief General Counsel here at ITS, very well and it was such a great experience working with such a strong, smart leader.

 2:23
 So when the opportunity came, I moved over in 2022 and was the, and I've been the deputy General counsel here ever since.

 2:33
 And I get to work with Matt Miller, who is the Director of legislation policy and now privacy.

 2:43
 And I'm just so happy to be working with them.

 2:45
 The Matt Miller.

 2:46
 Yes.

 2:47
 The Matt Miller.

 2:48
 Yeah.

 2:48
 Everyone's so excited about this.

 2:50
 I am.

 2:51
 I am very excited.

 2:52
 Yeah.

 2:54
 So I started here in 2016, just came through the regular civil service system.

 2:59
 So started as a senior attorney in the transactional, was now the transactional team, but we used to just be house counsel that just did everything.

 3:09
 So bit of a Jack of all trades.

 3:12
 Then over the years I've just kind of gone up the ranks first associate attorney and now I'm in my position as Director of Legislation Policy and Privacy, which just came into my portfolio last year.

 3:26
 So basically what we do is track and review the thousands and thousands of bills they had introduced in the legislature every single year and just try to make sure we're maintaining a good cordial relationship with our partners and chamber.

 3:44
 And just trying to identify any bills that could potentially, you know, have a large fiscal or operational impact on ITS, try to sort of guard the agency from anything that could potentially put us into a bad legal position.

 4:00
 And then also the policies, we review all those and try to maintain all of them.

 4:05
 And so when you get your lovely little email from comms every couple months, that's my team who's helping to do all that.

 4:13
 And then privacy, we help do the privacy reviews for any sort of new product or any existing product that we're making any changes to with the data collection protocols.

 4:24
 So that's kind of what I do here at ITS.

 4:27
 So, so you're still wearing a whole bunch of hats. Still a bunch of hats, but no more having to buy stuff.

 4:32
 Fair enough, fair enough.

 4:33
 We'll take it.

 4:34
 So many of our listeners are passingly familiar with legislation when it comes to technology, but let's level set a little bit.

 4:42
 Can you give our listeners an overview of why legislation is important for technology and development of technology?

 4:50
 Well, a lot of the new technology that we have can provide a lot of benefit to the state and to its residents, but we need to use it responsibly, and that is the goal of the legislation that has passed and the policies that we publish.

 5:10
 For example, we did publish the acceptable use of AI policy, and that applies to AI tools that directly impact the public.

 5:20
 And again, AI can be very beneficial, but at the same time, we want to make sure that it is used in a responsible way.

 5:30
 And this, these policies and this legislation is there to help help do that.

 5:37
 Absolutely.

 5:39
 Having guardrails can can really help not only keep keep the technology being used responsibly, but also like develop it the correct way.

 5:46
 Absolutely.

 5:47
 Absolutely.

 5:49
 So historically, what are some examples of landmark legislation that shaped the current technology landscape, at least in the United States?

 5:58
 So the big federal legislation that kind of created this landscape that we currently live in is the Section 230, the Communications Act of 1934.

 6:11
 We're going back a while folks. We're going well Section 230 was part of an amendments during the 1990s.

 6:17
 So not quite that far, but about 30 years ago essentially.

 6:21
 But this particular section of this law did was limit federal or it provided limited federal immunity to providers and users of interactive computer services, which we now consider the Internet.

 6:35
 It basically allows the providers of, you know, websites and applications some immunity from anything that a third party posts on them.

 6:46
 So for instance, if I post something on Instagram and you know, it's someone doesn't like what I post, that doesn't necessarily mean that Instagram's going to be held liable for what I posted. I would be personally liable.

 7:02
 And then just one other more state-specific one would be the personal privacy protection law, which gives, you know, some guidance and guardrails around how state agencies use personal data of our residents.

 7:17
 So when you are a resident in New York and you're applying for like your license or you're applying for public assistance, this law helps protect your personal data from misuse.

 7:28
 Extremely important, extremely important.

 7:30
 So we basically wouldn't have the current Internet landscape without these these regulations. Right.

 7:37
 Fantastic.

 7:38
 So we've touched on this a little.

 7:40
 We've seen an explosion of innovation in the last few years and a lot of that change has been kind of in the consumer sphere.

 7:49
 So what are some recent examples of New York State legislation that has directly affected consumer technology?

 7:56
 So first one we'll talk about is the right to repair law.

 8:00
 This was the first right to repair law in the United States.

 8:05
 It allows consumers to go to independent third parties or even themselves to make repairs to their electronic devices.

 8:15
 So if I have my iPhone and I want to, you know, open it up and change the battery, I can now potentially do that without having to go to, you know, the mall and go to the Apple Store.

 8:28
 So this has been a big push for a lot of consumer rights organizations, organizations over the years.

 8:34
 And so New York State was first to actually implement a law on right to repair.

 8:39
 New York State leading the way.

 8:42
 And another one I'd like to mention is a law that requires companies to provide clear disclosures regarding the terms of any auto renewal subscriptions, which, you know, you may not think is, you know, very sexy or important. Oh, it's very important. But yes, it can.

 9:05
 Those, those auto renewals can add up.

 9:08
 And this is something that requires these companies to actually get affirmative consent from the consumers before charging them for an auto renewal, which is very important.

 9:22
 Absolutely.

 9:23
 We've all had that subscription to the one service and then we go, wait, I'm, I still have that?

 9:27
 Exactly. So, in a similar vein, a lot of everyday like tasks and you know, things we do in our free time have moved online or at least rely on online services, and legislation around them has had to address that that change.

 9:44
 What are some recent bills that attempt to make those services work better for New Yorkers?

 9:49
 So the first law we'll talk about is one that addressed online dating services.

 9:53
 So when I was doing my research for this, I found out that there's actually a law that governs how just, I guess what we'll call, I guess your "in real life," your IRL dating services, which I guess still exists.

 10:07
 But there was a law that actually helped consumers or protect consumers against, you know, fraudulent dating services providers.

 10:16
 But now a lot of those services are now online.

 10:18
 So what they did a couple years ago in the legislature and the government agreed to was basically take those laws and apply them to online dating services because they started noticing that, you know, fraudulent accounts are being created and people are being scammed.

 10:31
 So what this law does is help provide consumers who are on these services more knowledge and more disclosure on potentially problematic user accounts so they don't necessarily get scammed.

 10:46
 It's obviously not a perfect solution, but it does put an onus on online dating services companies to monitor this and make sure that they are proactively trying to prohibit accounts that are potentially fraudulent.

 10:59
 And for more information on how to avoid romance scams, visit its.ny.gov/cybersecurity.

 11:05
 And that we have an entire newsletter about it so he can learn more.

 11:09
 Nice plug.

 11:10
 That is fascinating.

 11:12
 I did not know that.

 11:13
 Yeah.

 11:15
 One other I'd like to highlight that I found very interesting because I love to eat, I love to cook, I love to go out and try new restaurants is the restaurant reservation anti-piracy act.

 11:33
 And this bill requires online reservation services such as Resi or OpenTable to have written agreements with restaurants prior to offering reservations.

 11:43
 The goal is to prevent the use of bots and obtaining reservations and then upselling them through an online reservation service.

 11:54
 And, you know, New York City is one of the food capitals of the world. I was just there.

 12:01
 Can confirm.

 12:02
 Yes.

 12:03
 So hopefully this will make it easier for residents and visitors to get to a place that they would like to try.

 12:14
 That is a cause I can get behind.

 12:16
 100%.

 12:17
 Yes.

 12:18
 And two more we can touch them on like real quick are one that people may not think about when they all of a sudden decide they want to cancel their, you know, $20.00 a month gym membership.

 12:28
 So they did change the law a few years ago to make it so you don't necessarily have to go through the what used to be a very rigorous process to just cancel your $20.00 a month gym membership.

 12:40
 So now each gym now has to offer an electronic method for you to cancel your membership.

 12:45
 So you just send, simply send an e-mail.

 12:47
 You don't have to go to the gym, you don't have to get a certified letter.

 12:50
 Just send a simple e-mail and say I want to cancel my membership and they have to honor that.

 12:56
 And I don't know.

 12:57
 I'll talk this last one real quick.

 12:58
 Another one talking, touching upon.

 13:01
 So another law we can talk about is the law that prohibits landlords from collectively using AI to set rents for their units.

 13:10
 So essentially this was a change to the antitrust law in New York that prohibits landlords....

 13:16
 So multiple landlords get together, they have a software that can help them basically take all the data that they have on their pricing, their rents and all kinds of data, and then they AI can then determine what the rents would be.

 13:31
 This prohibits that.

 13:33
 So this was a method to help prevent that massive rising cost in the rental market.

 13:41
 Price fixing, essentially. Essentially, yeah.

 13:43
 So that's what this bill did.

 13:46
 One of the big technology areas that appears in the news a lot these days is social media, which we touched on a little bit earlier.

 13:53
 What are some examples of past and current state legislation that attempts to regulate social media platforms?

 14:00
 So there's a few of these.

 14:02
 So I'll take one and then I'll I'll talk about another couple of them.

 14:06
 So it's a very hot topic and we see a lot of movement in the at the federal level, although there's no massive federal law that covers any of this.

 14:14
 So New York and Governor Hochul have really taken the lead here in trying to regulate social media companies and how they interact with not only, you know, us as adults, but also the minors.

 14:27
 Someone law requires social media companies to post their terms of service in a conspicuous manner.

 14:33
 So basically, you can't just hide your terms of service, bury a link somewhere.

 14:39
 You have to make it very easy to find.

 14:41
 The law also requires the social media companies to submit reports to the AG that also includes their social media company's content moderation practices.

 14:52
 The bill's purpose was to require clear disclosure policies on hate speech and racism, misinformation, extremism and threats of violence, harassment and foreign political interference.

 15:05
 So each social media company that operates in New York State has to provide this type of data to the attorney general. And a few other laws that address online safety is the Stop Addictive Feeds Exploitation for Kids Act.

 15:23
 So the SAFE Act. I actually have two kids myself, they're eight and three.

 15:29
 So they're not necessarily using social media yet, but they are very well versed surprisingly on how to use electronics.

 15:37
 So I, I do have to keep that in mind.

 15:42
 But the, the SAFE Act restricts social media companies from serving algorithmically personalized addictive feeds and overwrite, overnight notifications.

 15:53
 So from 12:00 AM to 6:00 and there's a moratorium in that type of notifications to users under 18 without verifiable, excuse me, verifiable parental consent.

 16:09
 A lot of words there, but very important.

 16:12
 And then any addictive feeds will need to display warning labels indicating that it has been tagged as an as an addictive feed.

 16:23
 There's also the New York Child Data Protection Act, which establishes privacy protections for the personal data of minors. For example,

 16:34
 it prohibits the sale of this data.

 16:37
 It can only use it for purposes strictly necessary for providing a service. Right.

 16:44
 Yeah.

 16:44
 It's, it's a new, especially as a mom, like navigating this new landscape is so challenging.

 16:49
 It is.

 16:51
 It's a little bit nerve wracking.

 16:52
 But again, at the same time, you know, seeing Julian, my 8-year-old, learn how to build something on Minecraft, I think is is, you know, great.

 17:03
 And he can take that knowledge and, you know, build something special for himself.

 17:07
 But again, you know, these are the type of guard wheels we're talking about in terms of using this type of technology responsibly.

 17:17
 Absolutely, absolutely.

 17:20
 The other big tech item that is often discussed, often on this very podcast and definitely in the news, is artificial intelligence.

 17:29
 So are there any recent state bills that touch on the use of AI, which I know we talked about it a little bit, but not extensively yet?

 17:37
 Yeah.

 17:37
 So we talked about our own AI policy.

 17:40
 And then to add to that, we also did our generative AI guideline.

 17:44
 So agencies have a little bit more guidance on how to use generative AI.

 17:48
 What we've seen a lot of movement in is the requiring disclosure of AI in certain mediums.

 17:56
 So we see that in the political sphere with the election that the election law requires disclosure of AI in any sort of political advertisement.

 18:08
 And then also we've also seen that in the commercial space where now commercials, if you're seeing a commercial for a product, you have to you have to disclose whether or not any AI-generated performers were used in the making of that commercial.

 18:22
 So disclosure has been where we've seen most of the movement.

 18:26
 Transparency is very important.

 18:28
 Absolutely, absolutely.

 18:30
 Are there any final ideas or thoughts you hope our listeners take from this episode?

 18:35
 I hope they, you know, they're not scared to use this type of technology.

 18:41
 You know, this is for their benefit.

 18:44
 And you know, these, again, these these legislation and policies are there to make sure that it's being used responsibly.

 18:54
 And they can also find a lot of information on our website, on the state legislature website.

 19:02
 And we hope people explore this information.

 19:06
 Absolutely.

 19:06
 Stay informed.

 19:08
 Yes.

 19:09
 Well, Matt Val, we're coming to the end of our time together, unfortunately.

 19:14
 But before you go, we have one more, hopefully fun, question.

 19:19
 What are you most looking forward to this year?

 19:22
 It can be something in your personal sphere, in your professional sphere, or both.

 19:26
 You let me know.

 19:28
 I'm looking forward to my vacation next week, although at the time we're recording this whole by the time this is actually published, it'll probably be after I'm home from vacation.

 19:37
 But hey. Don't think about that.

 19:39
 Think about, you know, we're not there yet.

 19:41
 Yes.

 19:41
 So that's what I'm looking forward to right now.

 19:43
 Well earned, Sir, well earned.

 19:45
 Yes, thank you.

 19:46
 I will second that.

 19:47
 It is very well earned.

 19:49
 I too am also looking for our looking towards our trip to Lake George later this month.

 19:56
 Last hurrah before school starts. It's coming up. And then, you know, I can't wait to see what new technology and

 20:11
 We encounter because every day here is something different.

 20:16
 It always keeps you on your toes.

 20:17
 You are never bored.

 20:18
 No, you are never bored 100%.

 20:21
 We're very fortunate.

 20:23
 Well, thank you both so much for taking the time to teach our listener listeners about how technology and law really, really go hand in hand.

 20:31
 You know, people don't think about it very much.

 20:32
 So I'm glad we could shed a little bit of light on that.

 20:35
 And we can't wait to.

 20:36
 We also can't wait to see what new developments are on the horizon in both areas and how they will shape the future of New York.

 20:42
 So thank you.

 20:43
 Thank you so much for giving us this opportunity.

 20:46
 Thank you for listening to IT'S a Tech Podcast.

 20:49
 For more information about ITS, visit our website at its.ny.gov.