HOW’S THIS FOR TIMING, Y’ALL?? I PUBLISHED MY STORY/ARTICLE, ABOUT “A.I.” AND “TERMINATOR/SKY NET” WARNING, WARNING, DANGER WILL ROBINSON”, JUST A FEW DAYS AGO…(NOOWW FROM THE FTC AND CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU IS “THEIR WARNINGS”!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
HUMANS, MACHINES, COMPUTERS, A.I., ANDROIDS, ROBOTS, CHAT BOTS=”ALL ARE/CAN BE/WILL BE “PROGRAMMED” TO BE “STUPID-IS-AS-STUPID-DOES/SAYS”!!!!!!!!! (Rogue artificial intelligence chatbot declares love for user, tells him to leave his wife and says it wants to steal nuclear codes)=WHAT A WORLD/GLOBAL “TERMINATOR/SKY NET DISASTER” CAN/COULD HAPPEN!!//??
Posted on February 28, 2023 by The Warrior
“WARNING, WARNING, WARNING, DANGER WILL ROBINSON”!!!!!
Consumer Alert
Tenant screening practices: the FTC wants to learn more
By
Whitney Moore
Staff Attorney, FTC, Division of Privacy and Identity Protection
February 28, 2023
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According to U.S. Census data, more than one third of U.S. households rent their home — that’s more renters than at any point in the last 50 years. Every year, millions of people go through the process of looking for and renting a home. The application process can be expensive and not so transparent, and often requires prospective tenants to undergo a background screening process. Tenant screening reports often include criminal and eviction records, and some tenant screening companies provide recommendations to landlords about whether to accept a prospective tenant’s application.
Tenant screening practices also impact some groups more than others. According to Pew Research Center
, Black, Hispanic, or young people are more likely to rent rather than own, and so tenant screening practices are more likely to impact these populations.
The Federal Trade Commission and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau want to better understand how these issues are playing out across the rental housing industry. To learn more, the FTC and CFPB have put out a Request for Information to get comments from tenants, prospective tenants, tenants’ rights and housing advocacy groups, property managers, landlords, tenant screening companies, and others about their experiences.
To file a comment, submit it online at ftc.gov/tenantscreening. Your comment will be public, so don’t include any confidential or sensitive information. Your comment must be submitted by May 30, 2023.
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Business Blog
Tenant screening practices: The FTC wants to hear from you
By
Whitney Moore, Attorney, FTC Division of Privacy and Identity Protection
February 28, 2023
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Millions of people in the U.S. rent their home. Their landlord could be a small mom-and-pop property owner, a large property management company, a public housing agency, or some other kind of organization. Many of these landlords buy applicants’ credit reports or use tenant screening companies to assist in evaluating prospective tenants. Tenant screening companies are consumer reporting agencies that compile information about the prospective tenant into tenant screening reports (which often disclose any criminal and eviction records in the tenant’s background, along with credit report information). Some tenant screening companies also provide recommendations to landlords about whether to approve a prospective tenant’s application.
The FTC and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau want to better understand how these issues are playing out across the rental housing industry. To learn more, the FTC and CFPB have put out a Request for Information to get comments from members of the public – including tenants, landlords, and tenant screening companies – about their experiences.
The Request for Information covers a wide range of issues, including:
- How landlords decide on their tenant screening criteria, and how that affects prospective tenants
- How landlords use specific kinds of background information (including eviction and housing court records and criminal records), and whether there are additional steps regulators could take to improve that process
- How landlords set application and screening fees and how those fees impact prospective renters
- How tenant screening companies’ recommendation algorithms are designed and how they play a role in whether a prospective renter qualifies for rental housing
The FTC encourages comments from tenants, prospective tenants, tenants’ rights and housing advocacy groups, property managers, landlords, tenant screening companies, and other consumer reporting agencies.
To file a comment, submit it online at www.ftc.gov/tenantscreening. Your comment will be public, so don’t include any confidential or sensitive information. File your comment by May 30, 2023.
Tags:
- Consumer Protection
- Bureau of Consumer Protection
- Real Estate and Mortgages
- Privacy and Security
- Credit Reporting
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https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/blog/2023/02/keep-your-ai-claims-check?utm_source=govdelivery
Business Blog
Keep your AI claims in check
By
Michael Atleson, Attorney, FTC Division of Advertising Practices
February 27, 2023
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A creature is formed of clay. A puppet becomes a boy. A monster rises in a lab. A computer takes over a spaceship. And all manner of robots serve or control us. For generations we’ve told ourselves stories, using themes of magic and science, about inanimate things that we bring to life or imbue with power beyond human capacity. Is it any wonder that we can be primed to accept what marketers say about new tools and devices that supposedly reflect the abilities and benefits of artificial intelligence (AI)?
And what exactly is “artificial intelligence” anyway? It’s an ambiguous term with many possible definitions. It often refers to a variety of technological tools and techniques that use computation to perform tasks such as predictions, decisions, or recommendations. But one thing is for sure: it’s a marketing term. Right now it’s a hot one. And at the FTC, one thing we know about hot marketing terms is that some advertisers won’t be able to stop themselves from overusing and abusing them.
AI hype is playing out today across many products, from toys to cars to chatbots and a lot of things in between. Breathless media accounts don’t help, but it starts with the companies that do the developing and selling. We’ve already warned businesses to avoid using automated tools that have biased or discriminatory impacts. But the fact is that some products with AI claims might not even work as advertised in the first place. In some cases, this lack of efficacy may exist regardless of what other harm the products might cause. Marketers should know that — for FTC enforcement purposes — false or unsubstantiated claims about a product’s efficacy are our bread and butter.
When you talk about AI in your advertising, the FTC may be wondering, among other things:
Are you exaggerating what your AI product can do? Or even claiming it can do something beyond the current capability of any AI or automated technology? For example, we’re not yet living in the realm of science fiction, where computers can generally make trustworthy predictions of human behavior. Your performance claims would be deceptive if they lack scientific support or if they apply only to certain types of users or under certain conditions.
Are you promising that your AI product does something better than a non-AI product? It’s not uncommon for advertisers to say that some new-fangled technology makes their product better – perhaps to justify a higher price or influence labor decisions. You need adequate proof for that kind of comparative claim, too, and if such proof is impossible to get, then don’t make the claim.
Are you aware of the risks? You need to know about the reasonably foreseeable risks and impact of your AI product before putting it on the market. If something goes wrong – maybe it fails or yields biased results – you can’t just blame a third-party developer of the technology. And you can’t say you’re not responsible because that technology is a “black box” you can’t understand or didn’t know how to test.
Does the product actually use AI at all? If you think you can get away with baseless claims that your product is AI-enabled, think again. In an investigation, FTC technologists and others can look under the hood and analyze other materials to see if what’s inside matches up with your claims. Before labeling your product as AI-powered, note also that merely using an AI tool in the development process is not the same as a product having AI in it.
This message is not new. Advertisers should take another look at our earlier AI guidance, which focused on fairness and equity but also said, clearly, not to overpromise what your algorithm or AI-based tool can deliver. Whatever it can or can’t do, AI is important, and so are the claims you make about it. You don’t need a machine to predict what the FTC might do when those claims are unsupported.
Tags:
- Consumer Protection
- Bureau of Consumer Protection
- Human-computer interaction
- Technology
- Advertising and Marketing
- Advertising and Marketing Basics
Keep your AI claims in check
