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The Face As An Infrastructure

The Face As An Infrastructure

In media studies, infrastructures are defined as foundational technologies, services and facilities that enable the communication of information and expression. “The face” has become an increasingly significant aspect of many of these infrastructures and thus, we may argue that...
Big data behind China’s “Health Code” system

Big data behind China’s “Health Code” system

As a common application of digital epidemic prevention, China's "Health Code" system has played an important role in epidemic prevention and control and has become one of the highlights of China's digital epidemic response to the COVID -19 outbreak....
“Hey Siri, are you sharing my private data”: A commentary on the impact virtual personal assistants have on surveillance capitalism and user information consumption

“Hey Siri, are you sharing my private data”: A commentary on the impact virtual personal assistants have on surveillance capitalism and user information consumption

For a digitally immersed society driven by technological developments and innovations, personal voice-controlled virtual assistants such as Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, or Apple Siri have become a crucial component to task completion, user interaction, and information consumption. Virtual personal...
Contact tracing: an aid for humanity or a Trojan horse of surveillance?

Contact tracing: an aid for humanity or a Trojan horse of surveillance?

By Sophie Letschert (smwletschert@outlook.com), Caroline Stanislawczyk (claarecaro@gmail.com) and Karlygash Nurdilda (k.nurdilda@gmail.com) Introduction Can contact tracing apps become the ultimate flooding gates for private data to flow into the hands of the third parties, bringing out health surveillance en masse?...
Health Code, a tool to tackle COVID-19 or automatize social control?

Health Code, a tool to tackle COVID-19 or automatize social control?

“Please show your Health Code.” A few months since the COVID-19 pandemic started, almost all public places in China have posted such requests at the entrances. Health Code, a color-based application, is rolled out to control people’s movements and...
Health QR code (system): reasonable data collection or tracking surveillance under the fantasy of Big Data?

Health QR code (system): reasonable data collection or tracking surveillance under the fantasy of Big Data?

Health Code, a personal QR code created by the government of Hangzhou in cooperation with mobile giant Alipay and designed for collecting and controlling the covid-19 cases, was initially launched in Hangzhou on February 11th, 2020 and was widely...
A(m)I beautiful? – Questioning AI through a Biometric Mirror

A(m)I beautiful? – Questioning AI through a Biometric Mirror

As AI integrates its way into everyday life, it raises more and more questions on whether to see this technology as assisting or oppressive. Facial recognition art installation Biometric Mirror (2018) contributes to this critical approach, challenging the ethics...
Have You Gone Green? INFRAWARE as a Digital Intervention for Environmental Awareness

Have You Gone Green? INFRAWARE as a Digital Intervention for Environmental Awareness

INFRAWARE (composed of the words infrastructure, awareness and hard/software) is a browser plug-in that displays how your personal use of technology is deeply entangled with the planet’s resources and the environmental crisis we are currently experiencing. Go green. Paperless...
Beware of Stalkerware

Beware of Stalkerware

In our modern age as internet users, our data is constantly being collected and used, location services can easily track us, and websites monitor our presence online. We make ourselves vulnerable to location tracking, information gathering, and privacy infringement...
Smart Home Technologies and the Transformation Of Domestic Space

Smart Home Technologies and the Transformation Of Domestic Space

Since Gordon Moore’s prophetic law in 1965, in which he claimed that microchips would develop so that the speed would double while size would decrease every year, has allowed for the evolution of ubiquitous computing and its introduction into...
Are we compromising our privacy and safety for comfort and ease?

Are we compromising our privacy and safety for comfort and ease?

    We are becoming more and more used to the idea of new technology being embedded, into our everyday lives and activities. Marshall McLuhan believes that we treat “technologies as extended bodily organs.” (Durham Peters) We are continuously experimenting...
“Be the Exception” for New Balance: Brand Surveillance and the Corporatization of Individuality

“Be the Exception” for New Balance: Brand Surveillance and the Corporatization of Individuality

New Balance’s New York Fashion Week installation, “Real Time Exception Spotting,” combines surveillance and algorithmic technologies to celebrate  and reward personal expression through style. But what does it mean for an algorithm to quantify individuality? And can surveillance technologies,...
SleepScore Max: Are Big Data the New Digital Doctors?

SleepScore Max: Are Big Data the New Digital Doctors?

In the present media landscape, big data has revolutionized the way in which we regulate, analyse and influence data across several industries — one of which is healthcare. With the ability to monitor patients based on sensors embedded in...
Power according to Foucault

Power according to Foucault

Introduction This article gives a short overview about several concepts related to ‘power’ from 20th century French social theorist Michel Foucault. He was highly influenced by Jean Hyppolite and Louis Althusser. Foucault is both associated as a structuralist and...
The Kakao Empire: The South Korean Example of a Digitalized Lifestyle

The Kakao Empire: The South Korean Example of a Digitalized Lifestyle

In South Korea, you can do everything with Kakao. You can send an ice cream cake to your friends, get updates about new mobile games, manage a bank account, call a taxi and much, much more. Although it may...
‘M’ Assistant – a New Territory For Advertising

‘M’ Assistant – a New Territory For Advertising

‘M’ is an Artificial Intelligent virtual assistant inside Messenger which aims to be helpful to its users when appropriate. M Assistant analyzes their normal conversation on Messenger and pops up to suggest one of the features within the app...