Main Page/Crash Courses/Systems and Policies/Week four

Week 4: Vendors

• Real time lecture: June 10th 9:30 - 11:30 Pacific/12:30 - 2:30 Eastern on Zoom https://zoom.us/j/9129428892

Readings

Lots of readings this week, I know! Get through whatever you get through.

• Addressing the alarming systems of surveillance built by library vendors: https://sparcopen.org/news/2021/addressing-the-alarming-systems-of-surveillance-built-by-library-vendors/
• Vendor privacy scorecard: https://github.com/alisonLFP/libraryfreedominstitute/blob/master/LFI2/finalprojects/Library%20Freedom-%20Vendor%20Scorecard-%20110719.pdf
• NISO consensus principles: https://groups.niso.org/apps/group_public/download.php/16064/NISO%20Privacy%20Principles.pdf
• ALA library privacy guidelines for vendors: https://notechforice.com/lawletter/
• Inequality in Knowledge Production: The Integration of Academic Infrastructure by Big Publishers https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01816707/document
• EFF’s How to Assess Vendors’ Data Security: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/01/how-assess-vendors-data-security
• Gale Analytics/California Grand Jury story: https://www.libraryjournal.com/?detailStory=california-grand-jury-data-analytics-threaten-patron-privacy
• Librarianship at the crossroads of ICE surveillance: http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2019/ice-surveillance/
• Activists are suing Thomson Reuters over its sale of personal data: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/03/18/technology-202-activists-are-suing-thomson-reuters-over-its-sale-personal-data/
• No Tech for ICE campaign: https://notechforice.com/lawletter/
• LexisNexis to provide giant database of personal info to ICE: https://theintercept.com/2021/04/02/ice-database-surveillance-lexisnexis/
• Ethical financial stewardship: one library's examination of vendor business practices (co-authored by Lorelle Gianelli, who is in this course!!!!): http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2021/ethical-financial-stewardship/

Some vendor privacy policies

Scan through a couple of these and take note of anything you think is alarming or interesting, anything worth discussing with the group. You can also feel free to look up another library vendor of your choosing. How do these privacy policies line up with best practices in the field, like the NISO privacy principles, or the ALA vendor privacy guidelines?

• Kanopy https://www.kanopy.com/privacy
• Cengage (Gale) https://www.cengage.com/privacy/
• Wix https://www.wix.com/about/privacy
• ProQuest https://about.proquest.com/en/about/privacy-policy/
• RELX https://www.relx.com/site-services/privacy
• Thomson Reuters https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en/privacy-statement.html and https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en/trust-center/data-privacy-information.html

Discussion

• Where do you see opportunities for resisting or challenging the awful vendor practices we discussed today? What are small, harm reduction steps? What are starting points for bigger action?
• What are the challenges to standing up to these vendor practices?
• How do vendor privacy policies line up with best practices in the field, like the NISO privacy principles, or the ALA vendor privacy guidelines?

Tasks

• Lecture, readings, discussion forum
• Schedule final project checkin with Alison