Microsoft is handing over Bitlocker keys to law enforcement. www.forbes.com/sites/thomas...

“Don’t walk in” instead of “just walk out.”

Hey guys, is punishing human rights activists the government disagrees with good for free speech? Asking for a friend. www.state.gov/releases/off...

These rebranding attempts are getting more ridiculous.

"This promise of an AI future, is really just a collective anxiety that wealthy people have about how well they're gonna be able to control us in the future." - @tressiemcphd.bsky.social with an absolute mic drop moment about AI bullshit. Incredible words. Listen to all of it!

This month, OpenAI announced "up to $2 million" in funding for research on AI safety and well-being. This may seem generous, write J. Nathan Matias and Avriel Epps, but following in the footsteps of other tech giants facing scrutiny over mental health impacts, it's nothing more than grantwashing.

"...super PACs backed by Trump-supporting tech moguls and the social network giant Meta" will "try to use the 2026 midterms to reengineer Congress and state legislatures in favor of their ambitions for artificial intelligence."

Amazon “has persuaded cities and school districts to abandon competitive bidding and surrender to its dynamic, algorithm-driven pricing…This opaque system subjects buyers to erratic price swings and allows Amazon to covertly inflate prices and overcharge schools and cities.”

During questioning, FCC Chair Brendan Carr was asked whether the FCC is an independent agency. Sen. Luján specifically cited the FCC website calling it “independent.” I took a screenshot of the site at 11:54 am I took another at 12:22 pm and the word “independent” was gone. #FCCOversight

We’re so focused on the negative impacts of capitalist tech platforms on young people, but not nearly concerned enough about the screen dependence of older people.

The ACM Digital Library, where a LOT of computing-related research is published (I'd say at least 75% of my own publications), is now not only providing (without consent of the authors and without opt-in by readers) AI-generated summaries of papers, but they appear as the *default* over abstracts.

I think it’s also true that loneliness among women has historically been treated as an individual problem, while loneliness among men is treated as a societal problem. That, in turn, comes from an assumption that women are supposed to earn the company of others while men are entitled to it.

So excited to come home and find this book in the mail! Officially on sale today in the UK and in the US in February 📚 Basically my life's work, so I hope you enjoy it! paritypolitics.org Polisky Gendersky

it is increasingly difficult to have nuanced takes on "AI" but part of this is that the companies *themselves* set hyperbolic terms of debate that then reward equal and opposite reaction.

"The takedowns and restrictions began in October and targeted the Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp accounts of more than 50 organisations worldwide ... in what appears to be a growing push by Meta to limit reproductive health and queer content across its platforms."

Absolutely no way that Disney doesn't come to regret AI user-generated content of their characters openai.com/index/disney...

Is Instacart using AI to inflate the prices of your groceries? Alarming new investigation is a blaring alarm on the dangers of digital price manipulation www.consumerreports.org/money/questi...

“It’s capitalism and the height of digital colonialism” Low-wage Kenyan workers are training China’s AI models https://restofworld.org/2025/kenya-china-ai-workers?utm_campaign=row-social&utm_source=bluesky&utm_medium=social&utm_content=1765194720

STS/Communications scholar Morgan Ames (whom these authors don't cite) has repeatedly demonstrated that OLPC was ineffective at best, and harmful at worst, including in an award-winning book published in 2019. The real question is why economists don't acknowledge work in other fields.

Elections in India's Bihar showed how easily AI-generated voice clones and deepfake videos could spread misinformation and target voters. The technology appeared to favor bigger political parties, report Saurabh Sharma and Raihana Maqbool for @restofworld.org restofworld.org/2025/ai-indi...

Don't let anyone tell you that the Commission's DSA enforcement against X is about speech or censorship. That would, indeed, be interesting. But this is just the EU enforcing some normal, boring laws that would get bipartisan support in the U.S. (I bet similar bills *have* had that support.) 1/

“we estimate employment-weighted share of Americans using AI at work has fallen by a percentage point & now sits at 11%. Adoption has fallen sharply at the largest businesses, those employing +250 people. 3 yrs into the genAI wave, demand looks surprisingly flimsy” www.economist.com/finance-and-...

"We are exporting the very labor of teaching and learning—the slow work of wrestling with ideas, the enduring of discomfort, doubt and confusion, the struggle of finding one’s own voice." This was my rationale for saying no GenAI in our MA; others disagreed. www.currentaffairs.org/news/ai-is-d...

CDT Europe is releasing its first report on how the EU’s current approach to spyware is failing to protect democracy. Spyware is being used across the Union to target journalists, activists, political opponents and public officials. The risks keep escalating. 🧵

US telecom company trained an ai model to scan incarcerated people’s “calls, texts, and emails in the hope of predicting and preventing crimes.”

AND running unpermitted, polluting gas turbines AND sited in the predominantly Black Memphis community of Boxtown, which already faces some of the highest rates of asthma in the nation time.com/7308925/elon...

I've been thinking about how many journalists of color I know have gone through multiple layoffs and are tired of the instability on top of the stagnant pay, increasing workload, demand for more skills, threat of AI, and constant complaints about paywalls. It's hard to have kids or make plans.

I’ve been running around asking tech execs and academics if language was the same as intelligence for over a year now - and, well, it isn’t. @benjaminjriley.bsky.social explains how the bubble is built on ignoring cutting-edge research into the science of thought www.theverge.com/ai-artificia...

"The Wall Street Journal interviewed teenage users of Character.AI with the permission of their parents. The teens described relying on the technology to cope with loneliness and having difficulty setting it aside."

"My mentor always tells me, 'Kim, dogs don’t bark at parked cars." They’re coming after critical race theory, 1619, intersectionality because these ideas mobilized people. They gave them the language to actually articulate what they were seeing with their own eyes," says Kimberlé Crenshaw.

“To be honest,” Etoria added, “it helped me imagine how the slaves might have felt, going to another land in shackles and chains—that loneliness, that disconnect, that sense of loss.” www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

“AI workers said they distrust the models they work on because of a consistent emphasis on rapid turnaround time at the expense of quality.”

It’s blowing my mind that schools, universities, public services would run headlong into this. We spent 15 years documenting black boxes. This is a black box in a black hole!

New report from @cdt.org led by Varun Rao and myself. "Think Twice Before You Search: Deterrence Messaging Designs to Prevent Searches for Non-Consensual Intimate Images" cdt.org/insights/thi... #ncii #onlinegbv #ndii #deepfakes

Delighted to share my collaboration with @aliyabhatia.bsky.social on research that grounds online safety debates in what families actually say they need and value. We touched on four key topics: age verification, feed controls, screen-time features and parental access.

I really hate it when scientists keep saying that “we need to rebuild trust in science,” because it implies that scientists are to blame for the mistrust rather than the millions of dollars of dark money that have funded political attacks on science in order to advance a far right agenda.

This is a nuts story. An AI chatbot and image platform left millions of images exposed. They show what people are actually using the AI for: taking random women's yearbook, graduation, and social media photos and making super realistic hardcore porn with them www.404media.co/ai-porn-secr...

In my latest op-ed with @techpolicypress.bsky.social I address the problem of child sexual exploitation and abuse (CSEA) on livestreaming platforms. www.techpolicy.press/livestreamin... #csea #livestreaming #contentmoderation

Great. Really fantastic. I love computers. www.404media.co/a-researcher...

Horrific and illegal activities are playing out across livestreaming platforms. Research by the Center for Democracy & Technology shows that platforms use three major approaches to address the problem, writes Dhanaraj Thakur. But do they work? Platforms must provide proof of their efficacy, he says.

POV: you are a young woman celebrating a recent academic success

'Darkfakes,' 'Foefakes,' 'Fanfakes,' and 'Glowfakes': Morgan Wack, Christina Walker, Alena Birrer, Kaylyn Jackson Schiff, Daniel Schiff, and JP Messina systematically analyzed political deepfakes and developed a classification that categorizes them along key dimensions.

CDT’s @kateruane.bsky.social in @404media.co: “Providing tech services to supercharge ICE operations while blocking tools that support accountability of ICE officers is entirely backwards.”

New in @theverge.com - half of US scams originate on a Meta property. The company must do more. @lanalanalana.bsky.social and I weigh in www.theverge.com/tech/820906/...

Google has moved from moral cowardice (removing ICE tracking apps) to direct complicity in the violent, unconstitutional abuse of vulnerable people. As a civil liberties lawyer who worked at Google for ten years, this one hits me in the gut.

On the implications of #AIagents: www.reuters.com/business/ret...

I'm attending a workshop hosted by @techpolicypress.bsky.social tomorrow. They invited me to write a "provocation" about the state of technology and democracy right now. I think I wrote something appropriately dark and foreboding. www.techpolicy.press/the-dance-wi...

TOMORROW: How can civil society researchers produce work that’s both rigorous + high-impact? Join CDT, @datasociety.bsky.social & Society, & @aclu.org for “Advocating with Evidence: Lessons for Tech Researchers in Civil Society." 📅 Nov 13 | 10–11 AM ET | Online REGISTER: cdt.org/event/advoca...