Data Analysis Services - How To Do It Right

New York lacks central data keeper when it comes to bail reform analysis

ALBANY — If you are looking for data and analysis on the state’s new bail reforms, you will have to hold out for individual counties to provide that information or for private institutions to weigh in.

When New York passed the criminal justice reforms that took effect Jan.1, lawmakers asked each pretrial services agency to compile the data annually and submit it to the state’s Office of Court Administration for posting to a public website.

State Democratic leaders have said the data will be critical to measuring the fallout of the changes, which have brought harsh condemnation in the first few weeks from law enforcement officials and many legislators, especially Republicans, who said the new rules are endangering the public and may overwhelm the criminal justice system.

But the reforms did not provide any monetary assistance to help communities with fewer resources take on the task, nor did it take into account the wide-range in services by county, challenges that communities outside of New York City are grappling with.

Peter Kiers, New York Association of Pretrial Services director at-large, said the association will be pushing for uniform data collection, recognizing that not every county has the capacity to collect and analyze the data.

“Interestingly, the law as it was issued for 2020 is an unfunded mandate,” Kiers said. “If we really want to do it right and we really want to increase your ability to work with people and have a good process going, it’s going to cost some money.”

Often nestled in a county’s probation department, pretrial services range from electronic monitoring of people under court supervision to substance abuse programs that defendants can enroll in rather than sit in jail. Those options have become evermore important since bail reforms took effect, which requires judges to impose the least restrictive, non-monetary condition available to ensure a defendant returns to court.

Except, pretrial services vary by county - not all have robust programs or resources and some do not even have the services.

Six out of 59 responding counties did not provide pretrial services, according to a 2014 study by the Crime and Justice Institute at Community Resources for Justice. The reasons those counties lack the programs included lower populations, courts not supportive of the pretrial services, or jail staff handling the screening of defendants. The report further highlighted disparities in the services depending on the locality and resources available.

In 2018, the state Division of Criminal Justice Services provided a review of pretrial release decisions and bail outcomes to the New York State Bar Association, noting the challenges facing data collection in town and village courts where commonly used record-keeping systems are not in place.

According to the state Office of Court Administration, only Livingston and Saratoga counties do not have pretrial services agencies because applications were never submitted.

Data collection efforts have begun in earnest, under the recognition that New York’s courts system is fragmented in comparison to other states, like New Jersey, that have passed similar reforms.

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo's spokesman Jason Conwall pointed to Arnold Ventures’ commitment of $5.5 million to four organizations to study the state’s bail reform impacts. The limited liability corporation billed as a philanthropic venture by billionaire John Arnold and his wife Laura Arnold is partnering with CUNY’s Institute for State and Local Governance, the Vera Institute of Justice, the Data Collaborative for Justice and the New York City Criminal Justice Agency for the study.

Erica Bond, chief policy strategist for the Data Collaborative for Justice, recognized the challenges ahead in collecting the data but said the organization is committed to the task.

“We have a much more fragmented approach to criminal justice here in New York,” she said. “There’s certainly no funding built in to help support that work, and I think that the (Office of Court Administration) is going to be reliant on whatever the quality of data is that comes to them from various courts throughout the state. Individual courts aren’t well resourced or have great records.”

New York’s approach to collecting data differs from New Jersey, which enacted bail reforms over a three-year period beginning in 2017 and assigned the administrative office of the courts to compile the data and generate monthly and annual reports.

New Jersey also has the advantage of a unified court system that allowed for easy compilation, said Peter McAleer, director of communications and community relations for that state’s courts administration.

“We were well-suited because of our ability to track it across the whole state from a central office,” McAleer said.

Basic statistics on how many are detained, released on their own recognizance or under supervision as well as what those supervised conditions might be have been made available monthly since the reforms took effect, McAleer said. Other analyses on how it might be impacting different races and ethnicities took longer to compile, he said.

New York State Senate Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris in January 2019 pushed a bill that would designate the chief administrator of the courts as the entity responsible for collecting and publishing data from individual courts. While it passed the Senate last year, it died in the Assembly.

Gianaris’s bill goes further than what state lawmakers ultimately approved last year, seeking how many people are jailed because of failure to pay fines, rates on those who fail to appear in court, and the average time for a case to be disposed, among others. He intends to push for its passage again during this year's legislative session.

“Policy should be based on real data and empirical evidence, and requiring regular reporting of statistics related to the changes to our criminal justice system is vital to inform decision-making going forward,” Gianaris said.

Avast could be selling your browsing history. Here’s how to stop it

In a twist of irony, it was revealed last month that anti-virus software maker Avast is harvesting its users’ browsing history and selling the data through its Jumpsuit subsidiary.

Though Jumpsuit isn’t a household name, it’s been reported that the Avast subsidiary counts brands like Google, Intuit, Home Depot, Microsoft, and Expedia as clients, potentially amassing millions of dollars for packaging your private browsing data, ranging from Google Maps location searches to browsing history, for marketing purposes. If you’re a fan of the company’s premium or free anti-virus product, we’ll show you how to limit data sharing to maintain your privacy.

How to stop data sharing in Avast 

If checked the wrong box during the installation guide or later change your mind, you can make changes within the software’s settings menu. Here’s how to do it on a PC:

Step 1: Open the Avast anti-virus software from the Windows Start menu.

Step 2: Click on the Menu button on the upper right-hand side.

Step 3: Select Settings. Under the General tab, choose “Personal Privacy.”

Step 4: If you don’t want Avast to share your browsing data with Jumpshot or marketing companies, be sure to uncheck the box that reads “Allow usage data to be shared with 3rd parties for analysis of trends, business, and marketing.” For the privacy-conscious user, you may want to uncheck the other two options as well.

“We understand you may not want your data to be used for trend analytics, and if that is your preference, we respect your choice,” Avast stated in its consent policy. “If you would like to withdraw your consent, you may choose to opt-out in your product settings at any time.”

While this should put the data sharing to a stop, it’s unclear at this time if it’s possible to delete data that has already been collected under the terms of use prior to opting out. Avast’s website offers the opportunity for users to delete their own account, though it’s unclear if account deletion will also retroactively delete all collected data, including browsing history and any location searches.

It’s also important to note that Avast’s free anti-virus product does not require you to create an account, so data can still be collected in the background.

If you’re new to Avast’s anti-virus software, you’ll want to limit data sharing from the get-go. The installation guide will offer you options to opt into or out of data sharing in order for Jumpshot “to analyze market and business trends and gather other valuable insights.” During this section of the installation wizard, be sure to click on the “No, thanks” to sharing.

The cost of free

Since Motherboard and PCMag had unveiled the results of their investigation into Avast’s data collection practice, the company justified its actions stating that all the data that was collected has been “fully de-identified and aggregated” so that it “cannot be used to personally identify or target you.” However, security experts remain skeptical. The investigation revealed that Avast had collected information such as timestamp , persistent device IDs, and collected URLs.

“For both paid and free versions, we continuously monitor for, minimize, disconnect and remove all direct identifiers during the normal performance of the products and services,” the company states in its privacy policy.

Avast claims that the data harvesting is a necessary part of its business in order to be able to offer its products to users for free. While the anonymous data may not reveal much data about any individual, marketers can combine that data with other information they have on users to gain more insight.

We’ve reached out to Avast for comment, but did not receive a response in time for publication.

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