Industry actors, policymakers, regulators, and academics alike share concerns about scraping: the large-scale collection of data available on websites and applications without the authorization of the platform or in violation of Terms of Service. As demand for platform data has grown, companies have taken steps to limit access to user data. In response, unauthorized scraping is on the rise.
For researchers seeking to better understand platform abuses, such as mis- and dis-information and online extremism, web scraping can be an important tool for studying threat actors’ tactics and understanding patterns and trends of platform activity. The Mitigating Unauthorized Scraping Alliance (MUSA), which brings together leading companies and experts in a unified front against unauthorized data scraping, and the Center for Information Technology Research in the Interest of Society and the Banatao Institute (CITRIS) Policy Lab, invite you to a joint webinar to dive into exploring “good” vs. “bad” web scraping applications. We will examine safeguards necessary to prevent privacy risks; explore key definitional questions to improve shared understanding of “good” vs. “bad” scraping activities; and discuss areas of collaboration for researchers, industry, and regulators to enable researchers to examine key questions for tech and society while ensuring websites and platforms maintain essential user protections.
Speaker and Moderator
David Patariu, Associate, Venable LLP; Privacy Law Specialist (PLS); IAPP Fellow of Information Privacy, CIPP/US, CIPP/E, CIPM
Dr. Brandie Nonnecke, Director, CITRIS Policy Lab; Associate Research Professor at the Goldman School of Public Policy, UC Berkeley