"At least 49 family members and colleagues of Afghans affected by the UK Ministry of Defence's mass data breach have been killed, according to research submitted to a parliamentary committee." www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

This is sounding more and more like the Council of Nicea who meet behind closed doors and poke the chatbot until it says it feels something. arstechnica.com/information-...

Call for Abstracts / Panels PLANETARY SURVEILLANCE #SSN2026 – the 11th Biennial Surveillance Studies Network Conference 9-12 June 2026 Université Catholique de Lille, France Details: surveillance-studies.net/conference/ Submissions (open soon): ssn2026.sciencesconf.org

💥 New book out with @icrc.org's @massimomarelli.bsky.social and @universityofexeter.bsky.social's Ana Beduschi 💥 ᴅᴀᴛᴀ ᴘʀᴏᴛᴇᴄᴛɪᴏɴ ɪɴ ʜᴜᴍᴀɴɪᴛᴀʀɪᴀɴ ᴀᴄᴛɪᴏɴ: ʀᴇꜱᴘᴏɴᴅɪɴɢ ᴛᴏ ᴄʀɪꜱᴇꜱ ɪɴ ᴀ ᴅᴀᴛᴀ-ᴅʀɪᴠᴇɴ ᴡᴏʀʟᴅ 👉 doi.org/10.4324/9781... It's an open-access collection thanks to @ecpcmaastricht.bsky.social 🧡

deleted social media from my phone a while back so haven't been around much lately but dropping in here to share something I wrote about d'angelo, whose music meant the world to me slate.com/culture/2025...

David Simon, creator of ‘The Wire’, being interviewed by Ari Shapiro (NPR)

<< Overregulation of nuclear power has worsened the climate crisis, [Garry Tan] added. “What if we do that to the age of intelligence? The future won’t repeat but it will rhyme.” >> www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2...

Reuters: 'The modernization of the US Army's battlefield communications network being undertaken by Anduril, Palantir and others is rife with "fundamental security" problems and vulnerabilities; should be treated as a "very high risk," according to an internal memo.' www.reuters.com/business/aer...

We are hiring! The DTD Lab invites applications for our 2026 postdoctoral cohort. Areas I'd love to supervise: gender/techno-authoritarianism, data visibility, urban governance, night studies, cultural practices, and all things related to tech policy. More info: jobs.virginia.edu/us/en/job/R0...

Has anyone written about which theories of addiction (e.g. choice, disease/neurobiological, learning, etc.) underlie different regulatory proposals meant to address social media addiction? It would be fun to unpack assumptions made about addiction and how specific measures address these (or not).

You cannot be fucking serious

Here's an updated list of all the technology ICE has in its arsenal to mass deport people. We've added new sections on cell-site simulators and cellphone location data. techcrunch.com/2025/10/08/h...

All anyone wanted to do with OpenAI's new Sora 2 app was make clips of copyrighted characters. Now they can't, they're pissed. Literally what is the point of this app www.404media.co/sora-2-conte...

"[Ars Technica] asked Cruz's office to explain why a senator pressuring Wikipedia is appropriate while an FCC chair pressuring ABC is not and will update this article if we get a response." arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...

Want to be my boss? We're looking for an Associate Dean for Research here at the UVA School of Data Science apply.interfolio.com/168251 🧬🖥️🧪

How is AI changing the nature of scams? @lanalanalana.bsky.social & @alicetiara.bsky.social spoke to @alixdunn.com on @themaybe.org to explain how AI automates & scales the work already being done in massive, exploitative “cybercrime compounds” around the world. www.themaybe.org/podcast/gotc...

I have a short piece on smart infrastructure and techno-authoritarianism in Brazil in the new journal Dialogues on Digital Society ✨ Available here: doi.org/10.1177/2976... If you cannot access it through your library, ping me and I will make sure you get a copy.

Melissa Villa-Nicholas analyzes this phenomenon in depth in her Data Borders book in terms of the “data body milieu” www.ucpress.edu/books/data-b...

The UK announces mandatory digital ID plans

As Keir Starmer anounces a new Digital ID scheme, we revisit an article from the summer, warning that past attempts at introducing a national identity card point to a moral minefield without necessarily helping tackle irregular immigration. blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...

As I said on BBC this morning, the Britcard isn't a carefully thought-out digitization strategy; it's a reactive policy response to right-wing populism & moral panic about asylum seekers. A piece from earlier this year w/ @margchee.bsky.social & @empo11on.bsky.social blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...

Apple demands EU scrap landmark digital rules

New argument against AI regulation just dropped. Checkmate, atheists. www.wsj.com/tech/peter-t...

Assistant Professor Aaron Martin's recent publication examines data sovereignty and makes arguments for how it should be dealt with in humanitarian contexts. Read our interview with @empo11on.bsky.social here: https://bit.ly/46okcTz

It appears the UK Labor government is moving forward with plans to introduce digital IDs to address complex migration challenges www.ft.com/content/f2b3... In July, @margchee.bsky.social, @kerenweitzberg.bsky.social and I wrote about the challenges that lie ahead blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...

On ICE and IMSI catchers www.forbes.com/sites/the-wi...

A friendly reminder that use of Clearview AI's tech is highly restricted if not banned in many parts of the world like the EU, UK, Canada, and Australia. It's been repeatedly fined for contravening these country's laws. www.404media.co/ice-spends-m...

What some call the "splinternet" others describe as the exercise of technological sovereignty www.economist.com/business/202...

Ethiopia banned foreign imports of vehicles with internal combustion engines. China set up an electric vehicle assembly there. As a result, Ethiopia’s economy is decarbonizing: imports of oil and gas have been flat since 2019, while the economy grew 70% www.noemamag.com/the-new-geop...

🤣

New piece in @dialoguesdigsoc.bsky.social with @linnetelwin.bsky.social, @spdesouza.bsky.social & @joanuros.bsky.social Governing AI (also) means governing markets, institutions and people doi.org/10.1177/2976... In response to @linadencik.bsky.social, @teresascassa.bsky.social et al. 🙏

"Asking help from a chatbot, you’re going to get empathy, but you’re not going to get help." www.nytimes.com/2025/08/26/t...

UK government asks everybody to stop using VPNs. "everybody who's out there thinking of using VPNs...verifying your age keeps a child safe...So let's just not try and find a way around. Just prove your age." - UK government

Australia's age-verification regulation appears to be unravelling. Members of a government committee claim AV companies are wildly overstating the accuracy of their tech and unwilling or unable to prove they're deleting personal information post- verification. Several members have quit in protest.

ICE’s Office of Acquisition Management has issued a Special Notice of Intent to award facial recognition services exclusively to Clearview AI under FAR 6.302-1, which permits bypassing competitive bidding www.biometricupdate.com/202508/ice-p...

#CfP: Special issue on #BigTech in global #security governance! What happens when digital giants learn to see the world through a #security lens? Edited by @mg-borelli.bsky.social, K. Ermoshina, F. Musiani & @gulnarazakharova.bsky.social 👉Submit abstract by 21 Sep: policyreview.info/events/call-...

Counting without Accounting? The Evolution of Identity Technology and Social Justice in Kenya by @bomu.bsky.social et al. brill.com/view/journal...

This is a stupid argument. ZKPs aren’t bad because they’re not confidential enough. Worry instead because people can ask you to prove anything, at any time, to provision or deny you access to services, while saying ‘privacy is solved’! Rules, not disclosure, are the risk. Do better @eff.org.

A question for the AI lawyers and governance nerds out there: What emerging, draft or finalized AI laws/regulations mandate the development of international standards like the EU AI Act does with CEN/CENELEC? Is this just an EU thing or has the practice spread?

New paper out in @bigdatasoc.bsky.social on #humanitarian #data #sovereignty💥 doi.org/10.1177/2053... My deep gratitude to @kerenweitzberg.bsky.social, @margchee.bsky.social, @emryss.bsky.social, Quito Tsui, Paul Currion, @sophiebt.bsky.social, and @massimomarelli.bsky.social for the inspiration ❤️

Musk ordered the shutdown of Starlink satellite service as Ukraine retook territory from Russia, people familiar with the command told Reuters reut.rs/45mrXK8

Data Protection in Humanitarian Action: Responding to Crises in a Data-Driven World www.routledge.com/Data-Protect...

New blog with the team @kerenweitzberg.bsky.social @empo11on.bsky.social about the concerns we have about the proposed mandatory UK digital ID system blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp... @lseblogs.bsky.social

Our latest on Labour's ill-advised "Britcard" blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp... with @empo11on.bsky.social and @margchee.bsky.social

"Rather than being a defining factor in an individual being targeted [by the Taliban], it is likely that public knowledge of the dataset would be simply another factor in exacerbating a person’s existing vulnerability," the Whitehall review concluded. www.ft.com/content/dbba...

“According to data from the International Energy Agency, by 2030 the US will consume more energy for processing data than for manufacturing aluminium, steel, cement and chemicals combined.” on.ft.com/4nM39m2

Google Pay and Walmart-owned PhonePe together account for over 80% of transactions on India's Unified Payments Interface (UPI). The government plans to limit payment apps to 30% of UPI-enabled transactions for fair competition by Dec. 2026. restofworld.org/2025/whatsap... h/t @emryss.bsky.social

💥Great paper by @kerenweitzberg.bsky.social in @scmrjems.bsky.social, "Keeping people out of camps: biometric technologies, contested sovereignty, and border practices within humanitarian spaces", which explores the experiences of Kenyans registered as refugees: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

"On July 15, the [Chinese] government will launch 'digital IDs' for use on the internet, shifting responsibility for online verification from private firms to the gov't. This is a potentially huge change in the state’s control over data." www.economist.com/china/2025/0... h/t @margchee.bsky.social

A reminder: age verification is an "automated decision system" so the 10 year moratorium would wipe out the Texas law that the Supreme Court just blessed a few hours ago.