In California, Prop. 22 would give gig workers health care subsidies and other wage and job protections. | Rich Pedroncelli/AP PhotoSACRAMENTO — Phone notifications flashing endorsements. Campaign flyers tucked into grocery deliveries. Takeout bags urging a “yes” vote.
Bad actors and rival nations have already manipulated tech platforms in attempts to shape American political outcomes. Given how much data is stored on their servers, data privacy experts fear the tech companies themselves could influence the electorate when they face an existential threat like the gig companies do in California.
The platforms say the law poses an existential threat to their business models by requiring them to treat their workers as employees, while labor advocates counter that the companies have been depriving gig workers of health care and other benefits to which they are entitled. “A lot of the protections we have are not legal protections,” said Ashkan Soltani, a former chief technologist for the Federal Trade Commission. “They’re just norms.”
“There’s not much to keep a company, legally speaking, from doing this,” said Mary Anne Franks, professor at the University of Miami School of Law. “Clearly they make choices all the time about what kind of stories rise up and what is trending. I can’t think of any wires it would trip.”
Damn as if the whole attempt by tech giants to corrupt and abuse the referendum process so they can once more misclassify and screw over workers isn’t gross enough; now they’re blatantly misusing customers’ data and personal information in their campaign. These people suck