As New Yorkers scroll, surf and search their way to digital deals on Cyber Monday they have certain unique protections.

Last month, New York became the first state to enact a law targeting a practice, typically called personalized pricing or surveillance pricing, in which retailers use artificial intelligence and customers’ personal data to set prices online.

Tim Balk reports in THE NY TIMES that the law aims to prevent retailers from ripping off unwitting customers by abusing their data: jacking up the price of jeans for a shopper with a history of buying expensive pants, say, or lifting hotel prices for a traveler who already splurged on airline tickets.

Enacted through the NYS budget, the law requires retailers that use personalized pricing to post the following disclosure: “THIS PRICE WAS SET BY AN ALGORITHM USING YOUR PERSONAL DATA.”

The law attracted criticism and litigation from the start. Some business interests say it is far too broad and will cause confusion. And some consumers’ rights groups, who sought an outright ban of the practice, which is also called algorithmic pricing, worry the law is too narrow to meaningfully protect all shoppers from price-gouging.

But just about everyone seems to agree that the law…which in October survived a challenge in federal court…is a significant step in the nationwide push to regulate how businesses use their customers’ data.

There are bills pending in at least 10 states that would either ban personalized pricing outright or require disclosures, like New York. State lawmakers in California, a hotbed of A.I. development and regulation, and federal lawmakers in Washington are considering broad bans on the practice.

The push comes as technological advancements have drastically changed the internet and digital marketplace.

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A Riverhead man is facing a DWI charge following a crash on County Road 104 Saturday night, Southampton Town Police said yesterday. Denise Civiletti reports on Riverheadlocal.com that Southampton Town Police and New York State Police responded to a motor vehicle collision with injuries Saturday at about 7:45 p.m., according to a Southampton Town Police press release. Responding officers found three vehicles involved in the crash, resulting in multiple people being injured.

Four people were transported by ambulance to Peconic Bay Medical Center and a fifth person was airlifted to Stony Brook University Hospital for treatment of injuries sustained in the crash. Police did not provide information about the nature of the injuries. Ambulances from Flanders Northampton Volunteer Ambulance, Westhampton Beach Ambulance and East Quogue Fire Rescue responded, along with the Flanders Fire Department to assist the injured and safeguard the collision scene. Southampton Police detectives and the New York State Police Collision Reconstruction Unit and Forensic Identification Unit responded to investigate the crash, police said. The road remained closed in both directions until shortly after midnight.

Police said that Erik A. Yatvelasquez, 22, of Riverhead, had been arrested and is being charged with Driving While Intoxicated.

The investigation remains ongoing and anyone with information is asked to contact the Southampton Town Police Department Detective Division at 631-702-2230, police said.

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Get ready for a magical holiday moment like no other! The Village of East Hampton has confirmed with the North Pole that Santa Claus is making his grand entrance at Herrick Park—by helicopter!

You are invited to be there this coming Saturday on December 6th at 11:00 AM as Santa touches down in style to spread Christmas cheer. Bring your family and friends to watch this exciting arrival and kick off the holiday season with fun and festivities! This is a FREE event, and all are welcome!

Holiday Treats for Kids

Festive Music & Entertainment: East End Entertainment's Michael Variale will be DJ'ing and preparing the crowd of nearly 3,000 kids with holiday music, trivia, and more! Following his exciting arrival by helicopter, Santa will lead East Hampton’s biggest parade of the year!

Escorted by the East Hampton Village Police Department, Santa will ride to the back of the parade in grand style, kicking off the festivities at noon. Bring your family and friends to line the streets, enjoy the festive floats, and cheer on Santa as he spreads holiday joy throughout the Village of East Hampton, New York! After the excitement of the Santa Parade, the fun continues! Bring your little ones to Millstone Park in the heart of downtown for a special chance to meet Santa Claus from 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM.

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Meteorological winter begins today in the Northern Hemisphere, but it’s unlikely to be as fierce on Long Island, where winters are warming faster than the national average, according to data analyzed by Climate Central, an independent research organization.

Heat-trapping gases that have been pumped into the Earth's atmosphere, in growing quantities since the start of the industrial age, have altered both the timing and intensity of the season, the group says.

Tracy Tullis reports in NEWSDAY that discussions of global warming often focus on extreme summer heat and the drought, wildfires and misery that come with it. But meteorological winter — December through February — is heating up faster than summer in most of the United States, Climate Central found, based on records from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Fewer days and nights dip below freezing, and the coldest day has warmed by 7 degrees, on average, since 1970.

And while gentler winter seasons may seem like the upside to climate breakdown, the warming trend will have profound consequences for agriculture, wildlife, forest ecology and human health, climate scientists warn. Between 1970 and 2025, winters have warmed by an average of 4.07 degrees F, according to data from NOAA on 3,137 U.S. counties analyzed by Climate Central, based in Princeton, New Jersey. In Suffolk County, winter temperatures are 4.9 degrees warmer now than in 1970. For Nassau, it’s 5.1 degrees, the data shows.

The basic explanation for the trend is that mild autumns are lasting longer, and spring is arriving sooner. "It's not as cold at the beginning and it's not as cold for as long towards the end," said Shel Winkley, a meteorologist at Climate Central.

There will still be cold snaps, even very bitter days. But those cold snaps will be shorter, Andrew Hoell, a climate scientist with NOAA’s Physical Sciences Lab, explained. And "they tend not to get as cold as they would get, say, several decades in the past."

Climate scientists say we must dramatically curb and ultimately quit the use of fossil fuels to avoid catastrophic climate tipping points.

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More than a dozen companies once promised to bid for one of New York’s three available downstate casino licenses. Eight spent millions of dollars preparing site plans, figuring out zoning and unions and making public presentations.

In the end, just three made it through a regulatory gauntlet and are left standing ahead of this morning’s vote by the state’s Gaming Facility Location Board, where the key question is no longer how many bidders will be left out but rather will the three survivors win approval.

Today’s vote also comes after a decadeslong process and amid trends in which casinos, while still profitable, often aren’t producing as much revenue for local governments as sometimes projected, experts say.

Yancey Roy reports in NEWSDAY that the three remaining competitors are proposing casinos within the borders of New York City but in the outer boroughs: Hard Rock Casino adjacent to Citi Field; Bally’s at Ferry Point in the Bronx; and Resorts World at Aqueduct Racetrack. The gaming location board will meet at 10 a.m. at a City University of New York facility to cast its vote.

The board doesn’t have to award all three licenses — the law merely says "up to three." If it thinks none qualify, it doesn’t have to award any.

Each license likely will trigger 1,000 or more construction jobs and even more long-term jobs later.

A 2024 report by the Tax Policy Center found that casinos, in numerous American locations, often aren’t the cash "bonanza" states and local governments are expecting. Revenue is volatile and can decrease over time. Further, it warned: "Casino expansion brings in more revenue, until a saturation point is reached."

But casinos still make money and create local jobs, key supporters and a longtime analyst said.

"The ‘demise of the casino’ is premature," said Bennett Liebman, a government law professor at Albany Law School of Union University and a former member of the state Racing and Wagering Commission, the forerunner to today’s state Gaming Commission.

Whether the three remaining bidders can deliver what they promised is another question.

"There’s still certainly revenue out there," Liebman said. "But whether the locations of the proposed facilities will maximize the amount of jobs and revenue from casinos, that is the question."

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The Sag Harbor Partnership has announced that Nancy Remkus has been selected as the recipient of the 10th annual Community Service Award, honoring her decades of dedication, creativity and service to the Sag Harbor community.

Each year, the Community Service Award recognizes outstanding service to Sag Harbor and its residents.

Nancy Remkus is a lifelong resident of the area spending her life nurturing community through music, education and service. She’s a retired Sag Harbor Elementary School teacher and registered music therapist.

Beyond the classroom, Remkus has continued to touch lives through ministry, the arts and community leadership.

In every endeavor, Remkus “has embodied the heart and harmony of Sag Harbor,” the partnership stated in a release. “Through her music, her ministry, and her compassion, she has brought people together and helped our community find its voice.”

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From medical-aid-in-dying to natural gas to anonymous child abuse reports to the little old horseshoe crab, New York Governor Kathy Hochul has a long list of bills she must sign or veto before New Year’s Day. Yancey Roy reports in NEWSDAY that the bills touch on broad issues such as gambling, paid work leave and prison oversight. They touch on the future, such as securing health data, as well as long-running issues from the past, like the recognition of the Montaukett Nation.

And they deal with the quirky: Requiring approval from a dead performer’s estate before using his or her likeness or image in movies, video games or other audio/visual work.

Governor Hochul generally does not say in advance which bills she will sign.

One of the most controversial bills approved by the NYS Assembly and Senate now awaiting the governor’s action is officially titled "The Medical Aid in Dying Act." This bill would allow a "mentally competent, terminally ill adult," age 18 or older, who has a prognosis of six months or less to live, to request self-administered, life-ending medication from a physician. The measure also would provide certain protections and immunities for the prescribing health care providers, for example, for not resuscitating qualified patients who have self-administered the medication.

New York would be the 12th state to approve such legislation.

Opponents, led by the New York State Catholic Conference, philosophically resist the sanctioning of what they call assisted suicide. Further, they contend the legislation has inadequate mental-health screening for would-be participants, doesn’t require safe storage of the medication, doesn’t require witnesses attesting to a person’s mental capacity to know the person at all and contains no waiting period between a terminal diagnosis and receiving life-ending medications — which they say makes the New York proposal the "most permissive" aid-in-dying bill in the country.

Supporters contend that none of the opponents’ fears — meds getting in the wrong hands, witnesses being paid to sign documents — have been exhibited in the states that already have such legislation.