The US has paused Johnson & Johnson vaccinations after a woman died from a rare blood clot

A new lawsuit shows that facial recognition is officially a civil rights issue

Sponsored by MIT Sloan The Download Your daily dose of what's up in emerging technology Clotting concerns 04.14.21 Good morning and a huge thank you to my colleague Neel for covering for me yesterday! You should read his work and sign up to his weekly space newsletter, The Airlock, if you aren't already receiving it. Today: the US has paused Johnson & Johnson vaccinations while it investigates rare blood clot risks, and a new lawsuit shows facial recognition is officially a civil rights issue. Get your friends to sign up here to get The Download every day. The US has paused Johnson & Johnson vaccines to investigate rare blood clots   The news: Yesterday, the US took the dramatic step of recommending that healthcare providers stop giving people the Johnson & Johnson covid-19 vaccine after six women who received it developed serious blood clots and one died. The US Food and Drug Administration said it will be a temporary halt to give it time to better understand the apparent side effect. Johnson & Johnson said it would postpone the rollout of its vaccine in Europe, too. Some perspective: The rate of the serious clotting events could be about 1 in 1 million, making them “extremely rare,” according to the FDA. To put that into perspective, you're twice as likely to be hit by lightning. And obviously the risk of getting infected with the coronavirus is much greater. The problem is that the blood clots have struck younger women, whose personal risk from covid-19 is lower.   Sounds familiar: Blood clots have also been linked to another vaccine, from AstraZeneca, which has been widely used in Europe but is not yet authorized in the US. Both the J&J and AstraZeneca vaccines employ an adenovirus, a supposedly harmless component. Now scientists will investigate whether the adenovirus, or another aspect of the vaccine, causes an immune reaction that is leading to the clots. Read the full story. —Antonio Regalado The new lawsuit that shows facial recognition is officially a civil rights issue The news: On January 9, 2020, Detroit Police wrongfully arrested a Black man named Robert Williams due to a bad match from their department’s facial recognition system. Two more instances of false arrests have since been made public. Both are also Black men, and both have taken legal action to try rectifying the situation. Now Williams is following in their path and going further—not only by suing the Detroit Police for his wrongful arrest, but by trying to get the technology banned.  The details: On Tuesday, the ACLU and the University of Michigan Law School’s Civil Rights Litigation Initiative filed a lawsuit on behalf of Williams, alleging that his arrest violated Williams’s Fourth Amendment rights and was in defiance of Michigan’s civil rights law. The suit requests compensation, greater transparency about the use of facial recognition, and that the Detroit Police Department stop using all facial recognition technology, either directly or indirectly. The significance: Racism within American law enforcement makes the use of facial recognition, which has been proven to misidentify Black people at much higher rates, even more concerning. Read the full story. —Tate Ryan-Mosley Podcast: What’s AI doing in your wallet? Our entire financial system is built on trust. We can exchange otherwise worthless paper bills for fresh groceries, or swipe a piece of plastic for new clothes. But this trust—typically in a central government-backed bank—is changing. As our financial lives are rapidly digitized, the resulting data turns into fodder for AI. Companies like Apple, Facebook and Google see it as an opportunity to disrupt the entire experience of how people think about and engage with their money. But will we as consumers really get more control over our finances? Check out this latest episode of our award-winning podcast, In Machines We Trust. It’s the first of a series about the growing digital revolution in how we pay for things. We can still have nice things A place for comfort, fun and distraction in these weird times. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line or tweet 'em at me.)   + An interview with the iceberg that sank the Titanic. Gloriously ludicrous.    + Remember Tumblr? Here are some of its finest moments.   + This service sends you a poem a day.    + A tale of two briskets. Sponsor Message Register for The Social Media Summit @ MIT on April 22 The Social Media Summit @ MIT (SMS@MIT) brings together the world’s leaders in social technology to examine one of the most critical and compelling issues of our time – the impact of social media on our democracies, our economies, and our public health -- with a vision to craft meaningful solutions to the social media crisis. Hosted by Sinan Aral, Director of the MIT IDE and author of The Hype Machine, and Andrew McAfee, Co-director of the MIT IDE. Register free now. The must-reads I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.  1 A new covid-19 variant is battering India The country reported 161,736 cases yesterday alone, and has outstripped Brazil to become the second-worst affected globally. (The Guardian)   + The UK variant is more transmissible, but isn't linked to a higher risk of severe disease or death, a study concluded. (NBC)  2 Vaccine hesitancy seems to have mostly melted away in the UK 💉 94% of adults reported a positive sentiment towards the vaccine. (New Statesman $)   + We will all end up paying for the people who refuse to get vaccinated. (The Atlantic $)   + Millions of Americans might not be getting vaccinated because they don't know it's free. (Fortune)   + A cheap asthma drug can help alleviate covid-19 at home. (The Economist $)   + Flying, pregnancy, and the contraceptive pill all come with much higher blood clot risks than the J&J vaccine. (Quartz)  3 Researchers found yet more IoT vulnerabilities  100 million affected devices. And there's no quick fix. (Wired $)   4 Inside the fight to scrub offensive racist terms from computing It is a bit of a sad indictment that so many are expending their valuable energy pushing back against this. (NYT $)   5 Google has ruined its reputation with AI researchers Expect more resignations, and more protests. (The Verge)   6 Facebook's oversight board can now remove posts as well as restore them Here's how to appeal to it, if you wish to. (Vox)   + Facebook banned a troll network in Azerbaijan, then failed to act when it returned just months later. (The Guardian)   + Facebook let the president of Honduras artificially inflate his posts' popularity for a year. (The Guardian)   7 Israel may have destroyed Iranian centrifuges simply by cutting power There's a lot we don't know about this still—here's what we can say. (The Intercept)   8 The NYPD's robot dog is, yet again, freaking people out I'm not at all convinced this is the best use of $70k+. (Gothamist)   9 The far-right has lost control of the redpill meme It is very easy to laugh at these people. So let's! (The Atlantic $) 10 What happens if you have a heart attack on the way to Mars? ❤️🚀 We're surprisingly prepared for this eventuality. (Wired UK) Re-envision the "future of work." MIT Technology Review and Harvard Business Review have joined forces to bring you EmTech Next. Explore the leadership strategies and the new technologies that will power a forever changed workforce. Register now. Quote of the Day "More people are looking up." —Mr DePerno, a retired police detective, offers a very simple explanation to the New York Times for why UFO sightings have surged during the pandemic. Top image credit: MICHAEL CIAGLO | GETTY IMAGES Please send brisket to hi@technologyreview.com. Follow me on Twitter at @charlottejee. Thanks for reading! —Charlotte Was this newsletter forwarded to you, and you'd like to see more? Sign up today Don't settle for half the story. Subscribe to MIT Technology Review for paywall-free access to our journalism. Subscribe now   Follow us: MIT Technology Review One Main Street Cambridge, MA 02142

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