Dear @vonderleyen.ec.europa.eu, the digital omnibus is the opposite of what we need. In the era of hybrid warfare, we must make it HARDER to WEAPONISE our digital infrastructure against us — not EASIER. cc @kajakallas.bsky.social @andriuskubilius.ec.europa.eu defenddemocracy.eu/europe-secur...

🚨 Brussels, today 🚨Ursula! Stand up for Europe – not for Trump’s tech bros! As the EU unveils its “Digital Omnibus” today, we're rolling out billboards calling on @vonderleyen.ec.europa.eu to stop bending to US and Big Tech pressure and enforce our digital laws #StandUpUrsula✊

Following the #EUSovereigntySummit and the feeling is of utter disappointment. To see the much needed sovereignty umbrella being used to legitimize the erosion of rights through the omnibus proposals is just not where i imagined a continent that was so blatant about digital regulations going.

WITNESS has a group of 127 civil society orgs, trade unions, and public interest groups urging the EU to halt changes to the AI Act and GDPR. Reopening landmark laws would weaken the very safeguards that keep surveillance and abuses in check. #digitalOmnibus 🔗 wit.to/EUopenletter

WITNESS submitted inputs to two recent EU Commission calls for input (a) Art. 50 of the EU AI Act and (b) the upcoming Digital Omnibus. Our recommendations regarding art. 50 outline how transparency can work in practice while safeguarding rights: lnkd.in/dDmjnaMq

WITNESS submitted an input to the EU Commission's call for evidence on the Digital Omnibus. Our input invites the Commission to deliver a consistent implementaton of the AI Act and ensure fundamental rights are not affected, amongst other things: ec.europa.eu/info/law/bet...

s/o to @bcmerchant.bsky.social for mentioning this site nyc-friends.vercel.app that is just an ongoing compilation of vandalized "friend" ads -- it is genuinely some of the most heartwarming stuff ive seen in a while

EU countries will tomorrow give input on which parts of the AI Act they would like to “simplify”, according to a Council discussion note obtained by Euractiv. Read my story at @euractiv.com: www.euractiv.com/news/exclusi...

"Brazil's Supreme Court put former President Jair Bolsonaro under house arrest on Monday ahead of his trial for an alleged coup plot, underscoring the court's resolve despite escalating tariffs and sanctions from U.S. President Donald Trump."

At the one year anniversary of the EU AI Act, we at WITNESS just published our comments to the recently published Code of Practice for General Purpose AI. www.witness.org/the-eu-gpai-...

What a bizarre and strange world we live in. To see Brazil framed as a national security threat to the U.S. based solely on sovereign and legitimate decisions taken by the Supreme Court that helped save Brazilian Democracy is a real absurd. Colonialism 4.0. www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/...

Publicamos ontem, no Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil, um texto de opinião sobre o Tarifaço do Trump no Brazil - com @rafaelzanatta.bsky.social e Ale Gonzales. diplomatique.org.br/a-regra-da-p... c/c @direitosnarede.bsky.social @dataprivacybrasil.bsky.social

Falei recentemente com a Julia Braun, da BBC Brasil, sobre a recem aberta investigaçao do USTR sobre praticas comerciais brasileiras: www.bbc.com/portuguese/a...

As the US escalates trade probes and attacks on foreign tech regulations, the question arises: Is this about protecting the internet, or advancing a global deregulatory agenda? writes Bruna Santos.

Woke up yesterday a bit fed-up with Trumps de-regulatory Agenda and wrote a Little something (: www.techpolicy.press/in-the-trump...

WITNESS is one of the co-signatories of the Open Joint Letter against the Delaying and Reopening of the AI Act. cdt.org/wp-content/u...

Let’s meet up in Oslo! #IGF2025

Semana passada, logo após a leitura do voto do Ministro André Mendonça, falei com a Agência RadioWeb sobre o julgamento do art. 19 do Marco Civil da Internet em nome da Coalizão Direitos na Rede. Gravação aqui: app.agenciaradioweb.com.br/erp/ouvir_au...

At WITNESS we are concerned with the 10y Preemption to State regulation of Artificial Intelligence that was added to the Budget Reconcilliation Bill, recently approved at the U.S. House of Representatives. Take a look at our mosr recent Blog post: www.witness.org/push-for-der...

At WITNESS we are concerned with the 10y Preemption to State regulation of Artificial Intelligence that was added to the Budget Reconcilliation Bill, recently approved at the U.S. House of Representatives. Take a look at our mosr recent Blog post: www.witness.org/push-for-der...

GDPR Omnibus changed the mid-sized company caps to 750 employees, meaning that companies and organizations with fewer than 750 employees will no longer be required to maintain records of personal data processing activities in low-risk cases. single-market-economy.ec.europa.eu/publications...

1/ Last week, @domainincite.com broke the news that ICANN has removed DEI language from its website, causing justifiable concern from within ICANN's community. But what hasn't been flagged yet is how this might affect #WSIS+20 negotiations happening at the UNGA this year. A 🧵...

The European Commission is open to amending the EU’s AI Act following an upcoming review, a top Commission official told our #POLITICOAITech summit today.

The CoP must explicitly require AI outputs be traceable to their source model (identifiable & understandable) to uphold rights. This is vital for all models, including complex open-source ones. 3/3

Currently, neither the #AIAct nor the draft CoP explicitly requires transparency for GPAI model outputs. This weakens accountability & fundamental rights protection. Incident reporting efforts (Commitment II.12) aren't enough. 2/3

WITNESS analysis of the EU AI Act's draft GPAI Code of Practice (CoP) flags urgent concerns. One point -we need stronger Output Transparency requirements to ensure information integrity. 1/3

At WITNESS we just issued a blog post about the General Purpose AI Code of Practice, raising some concerns around the 3rd draft! Read it here: blog.witness.org/2025/03/eu-a...

"The media & political classes in general are being distracted by [Musk's] sleight of hand. This is all flim-flam to disguise what he is really up to, and his agenda is purely economic in nature.” Our CEO @imranahmed.bsky.social in @theguardian.com on the main reason for Musk's interest in the UK 👇

Absolutamente excelente esse episódio! Já quero ser amiga da @brums.bsky.social 👏👏👏

@aguoficial.bsky.social realiza agora audiencia publica sobre "Política de moderação de conteúdo nas plataformas digitais" e, para a surpresa de ninguém, as plataformas não compareceram ao debate - apesar de convidadas

Participei do podcast Resumido com o Bruno Natal (@brunonatal.bsky.social) falando um pouco sobre regulação das redes e tecnologias emergentes! resumido.cc/podcasts/res...

Huge thanks to @mdentandt.bsky.social and his CIGI team for working with @heiditworek.bsky.social and me on this series on elections and tech in 2024. And it was a privilege to work with so many excellent contributors to the series.

Use Signal to talk about protests Use Signal to talk about your wordle score Use Signal to talk about abortion Use Signal to talk about your mom's knitting club Use Signal to talk about parties Use Signal to talk about gender affirming care Use Signal to talk about the weather Use Signal

FoE to whom ?

Next time someone tells me Big Tech or technology is neutral I will show them this picture. The subtitle should be "The culprits"

Doozy of a first post. Meta's new policies targeting trans people, immigrants, and women are not going to hurt just us. These changes are pandering to the far right in the US and the EU. It's bad for everyone. My article for @techpolicypress.bsky.social www.techpolicy.press/metas-conten...

No matter how much we want it to be true, you cannot meet climate change goals while building hundreds of energy and water intensive data centres for the private sector. This is a tradeoff we will come to regret. www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-roo...

So, little to no surprise, Meta's offices in Brazil have just clarified that their recently announced changes to content moderation and the Fact-checking program are only applicable to the U.S. context. The confirmation came after the Attorney General's Office requested clarifications (+)

This is on now at @okfn.bsky.social You can still join us! blog.okfn.org/2025/01/06/e...

The icing on the cake, but make it a rotten one: www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

In filings required by EU regulators, Meta said it “proactively reviews" all ads before approving them. But researchers found more than 3,000 ads running in Europe that show graphic nudity and sex acts — raising questions about the truth of Meta's claims. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

I bet that #Meta is currently calculating how much profits will increase thanks to less content moderation, higher outrage and thus higher engagement vs. potential #DSA fines, before making changes.

Von der Leyen: *grovelling sounds intensify*

Genuinely baffled by the unempirical assertion that Community Notes “works.” Does it? How do Meta know? The best available research is pretty mixed on this point. And as they go all-in on an unproven concept, will Meta commit to publicly releasing data so people can actually study this?

Falei tambem com a @aosfatos.org sobre as mudanças na Meta: www.aosfatos.org/noticias/met... (Juntinho da @yasmincurzi.com )

Honra enorme falar com o @bromani.bsky.social sobre os recents anuncios da Meta: www.estadao.com.br/link/empresa...

Falei com a @agenciabrasil.ebc.com.br sobre as mudancas anunciadas hoje por Mark Zuckerberg em alguns dos serviços da Meta: agenciabrasil.ebc.com.br/internaciona...

Thinking a lot of what Arendt termed, "a fool's freedom." The deprivation of rights comes not from being deprived of the right to an opinion, but from that opinion not mattering at all. What the oligarchs coin as free speech isn't actually freedom because nothing we think matters to them.

Just went live on @uolonline.bsky.social on the recently announced changes to meta and Instagram and, well, its going down. (this is a thread).