The Coronavirus warning app should and can explain its opportunities and risks better
The warning app for contact tracing of newly corona infected persons was downloaded a good 15 million times within the first three weeks after its launch. Most of these downloads…
Live, love, learn – in 2040
How will we live, love, learn and work in 20 years? Researchers* from ten countries took a look into the future as part of the “twentyforty” project. The results can…
The Great Update of Research
The COVID 19 pandemic challenges society and its institutions. Science is particularly affected by the crisis, as it is expected to contribute with expertise to the solution of the problem….
Surveillance
The state monitors its citizens, Internet companies monitor their users – and finally we monitor ourselves and each other. Who is monitoring whom and why? What positive effects can surveillance have and when does it become a danger for a democratic society? Questions like these were posed by students of the Humboldt University of Berlin in the seminar “Tracing Surveillance – On the Trace of Surveillance” led by...
How COVID-19 impacts digital technologies
The current lockdown is boosting online activity – everything is increasingly shifting to the digital sphere. In this dossier we ask if, how and why the Corona pandemic will affect key subjects of digital technologies. What does this mean for the regulation of content on digital platforms? How is Covid-19 activating the digital society? How does it transform our online culture? How safe are tracing apps? What lessons can be learned...
Algorithmic decisions and human rights
Who is responsible if an autonomous vehicle is involved in an accident? What are the consequences of automated profiling of the unemployed? How intelligent is our use of artificial intelligence, and what visions and strategies do we need for the future? Innovations in the field of artificial intelligence are impacting nearly every area of our everyday life. However, algorithmic decision-making leads to complex human rights implications....
Digital innovation and entrepreneurship
Increasingly, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are investing in digital technologies to respond to the rapid changes that are now affecting almost all sectors of life and work. Many SMEs take this step either to realign their business model, to make their processes more efficient or simply because they are forced to do so by structural change and altering customer needs. But what concrete activities and strategies do SMEs pursue...
- All
- Innovation
- Knowledge
- Law
- Policy
- Leben
Can European platform capitalism be sustainable?
Which business models of European platforms are viable and sustainable? That was the question asked and addressed in a virtual event last week. Senior Researcher Nicolas Friederici shares his takeaways….
Tackling COVID-19 as a Grand Challenge
Tackling COVID-19 requires coordinated, collaborative, and collective efforts that take into account other grand challenges including climate change. So how does this crisis relate to other grand challenges and how…
The Corona-Warn-App is less a technical problem than a communication problem
The much-cited “Corona-Warn-App” was critically discussed in advance in terms of data protection law and potential technical problems – but such problems are only there to be solved. The actual…
Getting Involved: Civic engagement platforms – Where volunteering begins
An Interview with Hanna Lutz by Lorenz Grünewald-Schukalla and Claudia Haas In 2018, an interdisciplinary expert commission comprising nine professors started working on the Third Engagement Report, titled The Future…
Getting Involved: Data science for good
An Interview with Johannes Müller by Lorenz Grünewald-Schukalla and Claudia Haas In 2018, an interdisciplinary expert commission comprising nine professors started working on the Third Engagement Report, titled The Future…
»Operational« control of the crowd
Although the strong surveillance of the working, as was common in the industrial work, appears to have gone out of style, it seems as if crowdworking brings it back altogether…
Digital Social Innovation: from efficiency to effectiveness in digitalization
How can technology help organizations to more effectively tackle societal challenges? In this article we introduce the concept of effectiveness in digitalization, which, we believe, is key to any digitalization…
Owning platforms – cooperatives in the digital economy
Digital trading platforms like Amazon or Uber generate billions in turnover, yet their success has been overshadowed by their drawbacks for platform users. Could cooperative models ameliorate the flaws of…
Excellence and Trust – Webinar on the EU White Paper on AI
In the context of a dialogue event organized jointly with the HIIG and the German AI Association, the European Commission presented its White Paper on Artificial Intelligence on May 4…
Using Google Trends to track social responses to COVID-19
Countries with a high peak in Google searches for the term coronavirus tend to reduce their COVID-19 infection rates. Does it make sense to associate digital information search with the…
The coronavirus pandemic and its impact on cybersecurity
The coronavirus pandemic has impacted cybersecurity in several ways. The challenges range from the infrastructure of the internet itself to the spread of disinformation online. Nevertheless, not all is lost,…
Open access: critical mass
Marcel Wrzesinski has been Open Access Officer at the Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society for almost a year. The seasoned journal editor who’s been in academic publishing for about…
Digital tech and the pandemic
Perils and Opportunities How will the coronavirus pandemic affect specific kinds of digital technologies and practices? HIIG researchers offer some tentative answers. At this point, we have all been overwhelmed…
State-sponsored cyber activities in Coronavirus times
The coronavirus pandemic has created a gold mine for cybercriminal activities, including those sponsored by states, generating digital chaos. However, amid this chaos, a light at the end of the…
Is the COVID-19 pandemic social media platforms’ chance at redemption?
Faced with an ‘infodemic’ in the wake of COVID-19, social media platforms have ramped up their efforts to address misinformation. Facebook in particular seems to have implemented a surprisingly robust…
Seeing Without Being Seen: The Map as a Medium for Simulated Surveillance
An illuminated, 170 square meter satellite photograph of Berlin covers floor and walls of the exhibition space of the former Stasi-prison in Berlin-Hohenschönhausen – it visualises the surveillance network of…
The potential of digital training strategies in SME
The effects of the corona pandemic currently worry small and medium-sized businesses. At the same time, facing the current crisis, formerly analogue processes are adapted at an impressive speed. Coupled…
The Techlash in Times of Corona
The Corona pandemic has made us all painfully aware of how dependent we are on tech companies. This should not put an end to critical debates around tech regulation but…
COVID-19 and true solidarity on the internet
The social relevance of digital spaces for collective action is greater than ever. This article addresses acts of solidarity during corona pandemic and examines in what way they affect norms…
An Unlikely Experiment
“We live in interesting times. As much as we may fear what lies ahead, looking away will not be the answer. There’s no time for looking back but there are…
Artificial Intelligence and Sustainability
An interview with Martin Wimmer How does effective climate protection work and how can we transform towards more sustainable ways of living and making business? AI technologies are increasingly being discussed…
