The International Criminal Court is ditching Microsoft Office, saying it’s too dependent on US tech, in favor of Open Desk, a German open source alternative. The move comes after Microsoft revoked ICC head Karim Khan’s email access when he was sanctioned by the US for the warrant against Netanyahu.

📣 BREAKING: One out of every 25 attendees walking around the #COP30 climate talks is a fossil fuel lobbyist. New research from #KickBigPollutersOut reveals there are more than 1,600 in the UN negotiations in Brazil. Here's a thread with the top findings 🧵 kickbigpollutersout.org/Release-Kick...

💸 Do you know how much money Big Tech is spending on lobbying in Brussels? How has this amount been increasing? On what is the money being funnelled to and what can we do about it? 📻 Listen to our new #podcast episode to find out 👉 corporateeurope.org/en/2025/11/t...

Excellent piece on powers in the Crime and Police Bill to ban face coverings at protests. It argues that such powers 'cannot be squared with the overwhelmingly peaceful nature of contemporary protest in Britain', and shows how they will drastically undermine freedom of expression at protests.

🧵On our revelations today about the BBC Coup and the Prescott Dossier. The leaked ‘BBC Bias’ memo Trump used to attack the BBC was authored by Michael Prescott — a Hanover lobbyist paid by US tech/media giants tied to Trump. Full story: bylinetimes.com/2025/11/11/b... 1/12

These new changes to protest law, related to cumulative disruption, seem to have originally been a Policy Exchange proposal published here: policyexchange.org.uk/publication/...

A reminder that my book on the history of protest is now published. It is superbly produced with a great cover. Buy it now from @reaktionbooks.bsky.social

Great thread problems of lockin to AWS, due to lack of alternatives. AWS has hosted all of the UK Government's classified data since 2021.

Richard Martin: Counting Cumulative Impact: More Public Order Law Additions ukconstitutionallaw.org/2025/10/22/r...

The AWS outage today proves how fragile our digital infrastructure can be. Now, imagine the government had introduced #DigitalID cards on that same system. Who’s responsible when outages or breaches occur? Offline alternatives to digital ID MUST be protected.

Tomorrow's front page 📰 Palestine Action 'not close to being a terror group'

Legal challenge to Palestine Action ban can go ahead, court rules

Increasing military budgets as part of rising great-power competition is a disaster across multiple fronts: for the victims of wars, for an already burning planet, and for workers who don’t see real benefits from military conflict. New from me & @transitionsec.bsky.social co-director Khem Rogaly

🎉 Just launched! We’ve collaborated with @cplusc.bsky.social to launch @transitionsec.bsky.social — a new research centre that will develop alternative approaches to security and investigate the US & UK military industrial complexes as economic, climate and geopolitical threats. Find out more. 👇

Quite a bodying, here, for the UK, from the Commissioner for Human Rights, Council of Europe. 🏮 He points out the Supreme Court ignored human rights (which breaches its legal obligations) 🏮 He says, in effect agreeing with Lucy Powell, Parliament should be involved... rm.coe.int/letter-to-pa...

Civil society and human rights defenders are facing alarming trends across Europe, warns the Council of Europe’s #HumanRights Commissioner Michael O’Flaherty👇 🔗 www.coe.int/en/web/commi... @coe.int @commissionerhr.coe.int

A pure example of BBC balance. On the one side, on the other, all the way through. This leaves a really superficial account of what's at issue with leaving the ECHR and accepts, doe-eyed, that Policy Exchange had a "really detailed proposal" on the GFA, not a hot mess: share.google/qGXg9rHZYfPL...

NEW: Home Office announces planned new anti-protest powers, mainly aimed at pro-Gaza protests like those for Palestine Action. Police will be able to consider the "cumulative impact" of repeated protests and potentially order that they be relocated.

The Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation's comments on radio 4 today were worrying. He refers to a potential need for legal changes to enable the banning of protests to alleviate the burden on police for national security reasons, while discussing the defend our juries protest on Saturday.

'The UK Home Office demanded in early September that Apple create a means to allow officials access to encrypted cloud backups, but stipulated that the order applied only to British citizens’ data, according to people briefed on the matter.' www.ft.com/content/d101...

Lobbying at the Labour conference..

Police arrest 66 people at Palestine Action rally near Labour conference www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

My article 'Backdoor Executive Empowerment' is now available open access published by Legal Studies. The paper identifies 6 mechanisms the last UK Government used to obstruct democratic scrutiny of new changes it introduced to expand executive powers 🧵1/5 www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

The chair of the undercover policing inquiry faces legal action over decision not to allow blacklisted union activist Dave Smith to give oral evidence at the public inquiry in November www.hazards.org/blacklistblo...

A great read on the Tony Blair Institute (TBI), whose last summer party was held at McKinsey's HQ and co-hosted by ex-McKinsey current chair of NHS England. It includes important info on the revolving door between this tech and petrostate-funded think tank and Starmer's government, including - 1/2

12 more people charged under the Terrorism Act for supporting Palestine Action www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

'As well as journalists, Mr McCullough has looked at how covert measures may have been used against lawyers and others. It is understood his report runs to around 200 pages.' www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

📚 BOOK TALK: England’s Military Heartland 🎙️ Khem Rogaly, Saskia Papadakis, Antonia Dawes & Rachael Milliner ⏰ 7.00PM — 8.30PM 🗓️ Weds 24 Sept 📍 @housmansbookshop.bsky.social, 5 Caledonian Rd, London N1 9DX 🔗 Sign up for a ticket now! housmans.com/event/book-t...

another excellent piece from @davidallengreen.bsky.social on support for Palestine Action not being 'terrorism' www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/ideas/law/th...

Conor Gearty obituary - The Guardian www.theguardian.com/law/2025/sep...

Labelling protest movements as terrorist organisations without a full national security justification has a long-standing history but has clearly been further normalised by the UK Government's recent proscription of Palestine Action. 1/2

I wrote an article about last year's amendments to the Investigatory Powers Act and how they relate to the recent Apple encryption case, the growing use of AI by UK secret intelligence services, and the role of private intelligence services like Palantir. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

📘 Come to my inaugural lecture "Democratic socialism and the law", 6.30pm, 15 October: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/inaugural-... 🌹 What role does the law play in democratic socialism? It rewires the defects of contract, property, corporate law + residual ‘capitalist’ elements of our law, and more... 👇

I wrote this about why it's important not to do away with juries in criminal trials www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

For all the talk of decline in Britain today by the right, the thing that is never mentioned is privitisation and financialisation. Very glad to see @cmmonwealth.bsky.social tackling this head-on: www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Excellent analysis of the revolving door between conservative officials and the defence industry. open.substack.com/pub/democrac...

I'm devastated by Conor Gearty's passing. His seminars were electrifying, his research courageous and inspirational, and as a doctoral supervisor he was never less than kind, diligent, and wise. It is such a huge loss. In this beautiful article, he left us some of his wisdom, humour, and humility.

While in office, Johnson appears to have held a secret meeting with Peter Thiel, the billionaire who founded the controversial US data firm Palantir, months before it was given a role managing NHS data. theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Peter Hain says UK government ‘digging itself into hole’ over Palestine Action www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Letter of the day (in the Times)

'The University has paid a private consulting company KPMG to produce a report to justify redundancies, which they are refusing to share with the trade unions. University senior managers are hiding behind this report to hide their own failures and mismanagement, while gutting the workforce.'

Today, the High Court Judge will rule on whether to permit a Judicial Review into the proscription of Palestine Action. The judgement is set to be heard at 2pm.

1. The Prosecution only has to prove that your sign gives rise to a reasonable suspicion that you support a proscribed organisation: and 2. It's a strict liability offence-- no need to prove intention. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Watch as an activist is arrested in Glasgow for displaying a sign reading 'genocide in Palestine, time to take action' 'We're not terrorists', he said as he was taken away by police

BREAKING Following my request, the UK judiciary has now published the actual Afghan super-injunction. (Nice to have a win occasionally.) www.judiciary.uk/judgments/mi...

Yesterday there was an important discussion of the legality of Palestine Action's recent proscription, hosted by John McDonnell MP. Here were some of the key issues raised -

Elon Musk's anti-woke MechaHitler proudly announces a new contract with the Department of Defense

EXC Labour MPs have privately raised alarm at the number of sponsored corporate receptions for backbenchers arranged by the party MPs received invitations for receptions that include explicit advertisements for property developers or outsourcing firms -sent to MPs directly from the PLP office.

Leveson is in charge of ensuring the government doesn't abuse surveillance powers. Here he advocates the partial erasure of a fundamental safeguard against state abuse of criminal law, to correct problems stemming from politicians choosing to impose austerity. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

An important legal analysis of broader constitutional implications of proscribing Palestine Action.