newsarticles.media: Privacy News

Palantir CEO Says Legalizing War Crimes Would Be Good for Business

The AI surveillance platform provider Palantir is no stranger to controversy. It brings in billions each year from controversial partnerships with groups like Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Israeli Defense Forces, something CEO Alex Karp isn't keen on changing anytime soon. In an interview ... this week, Karp even took it a step further, arguing that legalizing US war crimes would open up a whole new market for Palantir. Unlike other moguls profiting off the military industrial complex who hide behind concepts like "democracy" and "national security," the Palantir CEO isn't afraid to put his mouth where his money is with disarmingly bombastic language. In a letter to shareholders earlier this year, for instance, Karp quoted hawkish political scholar Samuel Huntington in arguing that the "rise of the West was not made possible â€by the superiority of its ideas or values or religionâ€¦ but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence.'" While this could be seen as a damning indictment of Western civilization and its violent stranglehold over the world economy, Karp instead positions it as a source of inspiration. In another part of his interview ... the Palantir CEO reaffirmed his commitment to ICE, emphasizing the important role he plays in making immigrants lives worse. "I'm going to use my whole influence to make sure this country stays skeptical on migration and has a deterrent capacity that it only uses selectively," Karp said.

Note: Listen to an audio clip of Jeffrey Epstein promoting Palantir to Ehud Barak. Read how Palantir helped the NSA spy on the entire planet. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

Blackwater Successor Hunts Immigrants for ICE

A military contractor with a lineage going back to the notorious mercenary firm Blackwater will help U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement track down a list of 1.5 million targeted immigrants across the country. ICE inked a deal with Constellis Holdings to provide "skip tracing" services, tasking the company with hunting immigrants down and relaying their locations to ICE's Enforcement and Removal Operations wing for apprehension. Contractors will receive monetary bounties in exchange for turning over the whereabouts of specified immigrants as quickly as possible, using whatever physical and digital surveillance tools they see fit. Constellis was formed in 2014 through the merger of Academi, previously known as Blackwater, and Triple Canopy, a rival mercenary contractor. The combined companies and their subsidiaries have reaped billions from contracts for guarding foreign military installations, embassies, and domestic properties, along with work for the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. spy agencies. In 2007, Blackwater mercenaries massacred 14 civilians in Baghdad; several of its contractors serving prison sentences for the killings were pardoned by President Donald Trump in 2020. The government has so far paid Constellis $1.5 million, with the potential for the total to grow to more than $113 million by the contract's end in 2027. Constellis ... secured a $250 million construction contract at the U.S. military base at GuantĂˇnamo Bay, Cuba, earlier this year.

Note: Erik Prince's Blackwater got caught systematically defrauding the government. Then Blackwater changed its name to Academi and made over $300 million off the Afghan drug trade. More recently, Prince was recruiting ex spies to infiltrate progressive activist groups. Furthermore, the bounty-based approach mirrors a core tactic of the War on Terror, when US forces offered cash rewards for tips that fueled mass detentions in Afghanistan and beyond. This swept up thousands of people who posed no threat and had no ties to terrorism.

Spycops sent thousands of surveillance reports to MI5, inquiry documents reveal

Thousands of surveillance reports compiled by undercover police officers who spied on political campaigners were routinely passed to MI5, documents obtained by the spycops inquiry have revealed. Police sent undercover officers on long-term deployments to infiltrate mainly leftwing protest groups and gather enormous quantities of information about their political and personal activities. It can now be revealed that most of those clandestine reports were sent to MI5, helping the Security Service to build up large files on peaceful protesters who were engaged in democratic protests for an array of causes. MI5 still retains these surveillance reports in its files today. Officers have been criticised for spying on thousands of political organisations such as campaigns against racism and nuclear weapons, the Socialist Workers party, justice campaigns and trade unions. Their reports logged personal information about protesters, including their marriages, sexuality, holiday plans and bank accounts, as well as their plans for political action such as demonstrations. Stamped on the surveillance reports are a tell-tale sign – Box 500, a nickname for MI5 ... which confirms that they were sent to the Security Service by the police spies. Working in tandem, senior police officers running the undercover spies and MI5 met regularly to discuss the political groups they wanted to infiltrate. On several occasions, MI5 warned that particular police spies were in danger of being rumbled by activists.

Note: Read more about the spycops scandal and the dozens of activists tricked into having romantic relationships with undercover police. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on police corruption.

Governments Are Pushing Digital IDs. Are You Ready To Be Tracked?

Politicians push government IDs. In a TSA announcement, Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem sternly warns, "You will need a REAL ID to travel by air or visit federal buildings." European politicians go much further. They're pushing government-mandated digital IDs that tie your identity to nearly everything you do. The second richest man in the world, Oracle founder Larry Ellison, says, "Citizens will be on their best behavior because we're constantly recording and reporting everything." That's a good thing? "That is a recipe for disaster and totalitarianism," says privacy specialist Naomi Brockwell. "Privacy is not about hiding. It's about an individual's right to decide for themselves who gets access to their data. A digital ID will strip individuals of that choice." "I already have a government-issued ID," says Tokarev. "Why is a digital one worse?" "It connects everything," says Brockwell. "Your financial decisions, social media posts, your likes, things that you're watching, places you're going. You won't be able to voice things anonymously online anymore. Everything you say will be tied back to who you are." Even without a digital ID, Canada froze the bank accounts of truckers who protested COVID-19 vaccine mandates. With a digital ID, politicians could do that much more easily. "It makes you super easy to target," says Brockwell, "easy to silence if suddenly you become 'problematic.' Whoever controls that data has a lot of power. We're simply handing it to them."

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on government corruption and the disappearance of privacy.

Military contractors reap big profits in war-to-homeland pipeline

By leveraging the dual-use nature of many of their products, where defense technologies can be integrated into the commercial sector and vice versa, Pentagon contractors like Palantir, Skydio, and General Atomics have gained ground at home for surveillance technologies – especially drones – proliferating war-tested military tech within the domestic sphere. Palantir's Gotham platform was initially promoted as intelligence software for defense and counter-terrorism purposes. Now adopted among U.S. law enforcement, hundreds of police departments can use Gotham to analyze data on civilians' whereabouts. Palantir has gone on to sell similar software to other government agencies, obtaining a $30 million ICE contract this spring to help the agency track undocumented immigrants. L3Harris Stingrays, or cell site simulators, are sophisticated phone trackers originally designed for military use. Police departments subsequently adopted these systems to track and collect information on crime suspects. Defense contractors are similarly leveraging their battle-tested drones to capitalize on a booming domestic market. The broader public safety drone market is expected to nearly triple within the next 10 years. The DRONE Act, meanwhile, included in the FY2026 National Defense Authorization Act, would let police purchase and operate the systems with federal grants, thus flooding drone procurement processes with more federal funds.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and police corruption.

The Private Companies Quietly Building a Police State

Powerful tools that collect and aggregate data, enable facial recognition, and increase surveillance have become a bedrock of American policing over the past two decades. In collaboration with private technology companies, law enforcement agencies at all levels have experimented with how to implement these tools and created a large consumer market for them. Against this backdrop, it is essential to understand the role of the tech industry in both increasing the reach of local law enforcement and enabling mass deportations by the Trump administration. ICE is, for example, one of the largest customers for Clearview AI, a facial recognition company that has scraped more than 30 billion faces from internet sources. Data brokers, including one owned jointly by several airline companies, are actively selling data to ICE and other federal agencies. One of the most troubling recent developments in police data is that it captures information about all people. This "dragnet" approach to data collection is designed to give law enforcement maximum access to the entire population, transforming all personal information into potential evidence. Increasingly, law enforcement agencies are opting to purchase this data rather than collect it themselves, exploiting a loophole in Fourth Amendment legal protections. Some police departments have begun pressuring people into providing DNA samples at routine traffic stops, an attempt to expand their databases.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

The Privacy Battle in Our Brains

During the Cold War, the first implants showing that we could control animal minds sparked panic. The C.I.A. had its own clandestine experimental mind-control program. People warned of brain warfare. Those fears [are] back, along with a conversation about what it means to have freedom of thought at a time when technology is literally being implanted in our brains. Brain computer interface, or B.C.I. ... are very small devices that go right on the surface of your brain, where they can pick up neural activity. The data is transmitted via Bluetooth to a computer program, which decodes the information. In a sense, they're hooked up to an artificial intelligence. So the neural network inside your mind communicates with a neural network outside. And through that, we are able to reconstruct people's intentions. For people with degenerative diseases, or who are paralyzed, or who otherwise have lost important abilities, these implants have been totally revolutionary. These patients can move their hands, type and in some cases, speak again. Optogenetics, a technique for turning isolated neurons on and off, has been used to implant false memories in mice, raising the possibility that, in the distant future, something similar could be done in humans. Neuroprivacy is the idea that we should have to give consent to anyone who wants access to our innermost selves. But there's a question: Does neuroprivacy apply only to my unspoken thoughts? Or does it apply to the electrical activity in my brain?

Note: Read about the Pentagon's plans to use our brains as warfare, describing how the human body is war's next domain. Learn more about biotech dangers. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and microchip implants.

Intimate Advertising, the Next Frontier in AI Manipulation

OpenAI has announced that ChatGPT will soon allow erotic and sexually explicit interactions for adult users. Erotic features aren't just another product update; they deepen emotional dependency and encourage people to treat AI companions as partners rather than tools. This shift opens the door to what I call "intimate advertising" – a powerful new form of manipulation in which tech companies shape human desire and manipulate users for profit. AI has continual access to our anxieties, frustrations, desires, and secrets. It can understand how our minds work and detect when we are most vulnerable – and, therefore, most persuadable. What is particularly troubling is that this new form of advertising will come from entities that many will consider friends and life advisors. AI companion apps have been downloaded over 220 million times worldwide and are used regularly by over half of US teens. With intimate advertising, personal companionship becomes inseparable from businesses' persuasion techniques. A system designed to comfort you can easily be repurposed to sell to you. The deeper AI companions embed themselves in our emotional lives, the more vital it becomes to draw a clear line between care and commerce. Before Big Tech turns intimacy into its most profitable advertising channel yet, we must press regulators to enforce the idea there are limits on how far we are willing to let AI into our private lives.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on AI and the disappearance of privacy.

How Cops Are Using Flock Safety's ALPR Network to Surveil Protesters and Activists

2025 has given Americans plenty to protest about. But as news cameras showed protesters filling streets of cities across the country, law enforcement officers–including U.S. Border Patrol agents–were quietly watching those same streets through different lenses: Flock Safety automated license plate readers (ALPRs) that tracked every passing car. Through an analysis of 10 months of nationwide searches on Flock Safety's servers, we discovered that more than 50 federal, state, and local agencies ran hundreds of searches through Flock's national network of surveillance data in connection with protest activity. In some cases, law enforcement specifically targeted known activist groups, demonstrating how mass surveillance technology increasingly threatens our freedom to demonstrate. Via public records requests, EFF obtained datasets representing more than 12 million searches logged by more than 3,900 agencies between December 2024 and October 2025. The data shows that agencies logged hundreds of searches related to the 50501 protests in February, the Hands Off protests in April, the No Kings protests in June and October, and other protests in between. Some agencies have adopted policies that prohibit using ALPRs for monitoring activities protected by the First Amendment. Yet many officers probed the nationwide network with terms like "protest" without articulating an actual crime under investigation.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on police corruption and the erosion of civil liberties.

DARPA Going Hard on Insect-Sized Spy Robots

Future wars just might revolve around insect-size spy robots. A recent digest of present-day microbots by US national security magazine The National Interest breaks down the many machines currently in development by the US military and its associates. They include sea-based microdrones, cockroach-style surveillance bots, and even cyborg insects. Arguably the most refined program to date is the RoboBee, currently being shopped by Harvard's Wyss Institute. Originally funded by a $9.3 million grant from the National Science Foundation in 2009, the RoboBee is a bug-sized autonomous flying vehicle capable of transitioning from water to air, perching on surfaces, and autonomous collision avoidance in swarms. The RoboBee features two "wafer-thin" wings that flap some 120 times a second to achieve vertical takeoff and mid-air hovering. The US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has reportedly taken a keen interest in RoboBee prototypes, sponsoring research into microfabrication technology, presumably for quick field deployments. Other developments, like the aforementioned cyborg insect, remain in early stages. Researchers have successfully demonstrated the capabilities of these remote-control systems using of a range of insect hosts, from the unicorn beetle to the humble cockroach. Underwater microrobotics are another area of interest for DARPA.

Note: Explore all news article summaries on emerging warfare technology in our comprehensive news database.

Scientists Working on "Smart Dust" That Can Spy on a Room While Drifting Through the Air

In his 1963 scifi story "The Invincible," the Polish writer StanisĹ‚aw Lem imagined an artificial species of free-floating nanobots which roamed the atmosphere of a far-off planet. Like tiny bugs, the microscopic beings were powerless alone, but together they could form cooperative swarms to gather energy, reproduce, and ultimately defend their territory from predators with deadly force. Lem probably never imagined his evolutionary parable of living dust was just a few decades from becoming a reality – or that it would become the inspiration for the development of a real-life military technology known as "smart dust." Starting out as a theoretical research proposal to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) ... smart dust is now being developed for use in a wide variety of industries, from environmental studies to commercial mining. That's according to Interesting Engineering, which recently published a rundown of the state of present-day smart dust after decades of development. Though "dust" remains a bit of a misnomer – it's more like a bunch of tiny sensors capable of delaying data to a central device – there's a large body of theoretical and simulated work laying a path for practical microengineering that's steadily coming into its own. In the future, [smart dust is] hoped to be able to report a near-infinite amount of data in suspended, 3D environments. The current "smart dust industry" ... was valued at around $115 million in 2022.

Note: Smart dust can theoretically be used to spy on human thought. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

The Rise of the Thielverse and the Construction of the Surveillance State

Those who have kept track of the rise of the Thielverse, which includes figures such as Peter Thiel, Elon Musk and JD Vance, have understood that an agenda to usher in a unique form of authoritarianism has been slowly introduced into the mainstream political atmosphere. "I think now it's quite clear that this is the PayPal Mafia's moment. These particular figures have had an extremely significant influence on US government policy since January, including the extreme distribution of AI throughout the US government," [investigative journalist Whitney] Webb explains. It's clear that the architects of mass surveillance and the military industrial complex are beginning to coalesce in unprecedented ways within the Trump administration and Webb emphasizes that now is the time to pay attention and push back against these new forces. If they have their way, all commercial technology will be completely folded into the national security state – acting blatantly as the new infrastructure for techno-authoritarian rule. The underlying idea behind this new system is "pre-crime," or the use of mass surveillance to designate people criminals before they've committed any crime. Webb warns that the Trump administration and its benefactors will demonize segments of the population to turn civilians against each other, all in pursuit of building out this elaborate system of control right under our noses.

Note: Read about Peter Thiel's involvement in the military origins of Facebook. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

â€Surveillance pricing': Why you might be paying more than your neighbour

In July, US group Delta Air Lines revealed that approximately 3 percent of its domestic fare pricing is determined using artificial intelligence (AI) – although it has not elaborated on how this happens. The company said it aims to increase this figure to 20 percent by the end of this year. According to former Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan ... some companies are able to use your personal data to predict what they know as your "pain point" – the maximum amount you're willing to spend. In January, the US's Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which regulates fair competition, reported on a surveillance pricing study it carried out in July 2024. It found that companies can collect data directly through account registrations, email sign-ups and online purchases in order to do this. Additionally, web pixels installed by intermediaries track digital signals including your IP address, device type, browser information, language preferences and "granular" website interactions such as mouse movements, scrolling patterns and video viewing behaviour. This is known as "surveillance pricing". The FTC Surveillance Pricing report lists several ways in which consumers can protect their data. These include using private browsers to do your online shopping, opting out of consumer tracking where possible, clearing the cookies in your history or using virtual private networks (VPNs) to shield your data from being collected.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

Billionaire Larry Ellison says a vast AI-fueled surveillance system can ensure 'citizens will be on their best behavior'

Larry Ellison, the billionaire cofounder of Oracle ... said AI will usher in a new era of surveillance that he gleefully said will ensure "citizens will be on their best behavior." Ellison made the comments as he spoke to investors earlier this week during an Oracle financial analysts meeting, where he shared his thoughts on the future of AI-powered surveillance tools. Ellison said AI would be used in the future to constantly watch and analyze vast surveillance systems, like security cameras, police body cameras, doorbell cameras, and vehicle dashboard cameras. "We're going to have supervision," Ellison said. "Every police officer is going to be supervised at all times, and if there's a problem, AI will report that problem and report it to the appropriate person. Citizens will be on their best behavior because we are constantly recording and reporting everything that's going on." Ellison also expects AI drones to replace police cars in high-speed chases. "You just have a drone follow the car," Ellison said. "It's very simple in the age of autonomous drones." Ellison's company, Oracle, like almost every company these days, is aggressively pursuing opportunities in the AI industry. It already has several projects in the works, including one in partnership with Elon Musk's SpaceX. Ellison is the world's sixth-richest man with a net worth of $157 billion.

Note: As journalist Kenan Malik put it, "The problem we face is not that machines may one day exercise power over humans. It is rather that we already live in societies in which power is exercised by a few to the detriment of the majority, and that technology provides a means of consolidating that power." Read about the shadowy companies tracking and trading your personal data, which isn't just used to sell products. It's often accessed by governments, law enforcement, and intelligence agencies, often without warrants or oversight. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

Alex Karp Insists Palantir Doesn't Spy on Americans. Here's What He's Not Saying.

In an exchange this week on "All-In Podcast," Alex Karp was on the defensive. The Palantir CEO used the appearance to downplay and deny the notion that his company would engage in rights-violating in surveillance work. "We are the single worst technology to use to abuse civil liberties, which is by the way the reason why we could never get the NSA or the FBI to actually buy our product," Karp said. What he didn't mention was the fact that a tranche of classified documents revealed by [whistleblower and former NSA contractor] Edward Snowden and The Intercept in 2017 showed how Palantir software helped the National Security Agency and its allies spy on the entire planet. Palantir software was used in conjunction with a signals intelligence tool codenamed XKEYSCORE, one of the most explosive revelations from the NSA whistleblower's 2013 disclosures. XKEYSCORE provided the NSA and its foreign partners with a means of easily searching through immense troves of data and metadata covertly siphoned across the entire global internet, from emails and Facebook messages to webcam footage and web browsing. A 2008 NSA presentation describes how XKEYSCORE could be used to detect "Someone whose language is out of place for the region they are in," "Someone who is using encryption," or "Someone searching the web for suspicious stuff." In May, the New York Times reported Palantir would play a central role in a White House plan to boost data sharing between federal agencies, "raising questions over whether he might compile a master list of personal information on Americans that could give him untold surveillance power."

Note: Read about Palantir's revolving door with the US government. As former NSA intelligence official and whistleblower William Binney articulated, "The ultimate goal of the NSA is total population control." For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

Meta whistleblower Sarah Wynn-Williams says company targeted ads at teens based on their â€emotional state'

Meta whistleblower Sarah Wynn-Williams, the former director of Global Public Policy for Facebook and author of the recently released tell-all book "Careless People," told U.S. senators ... that Meta actively targeted teens with advertisements based on their emotional state. In response to a question from Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Wynn-Williams admitted that Meta (which was then known as Facebook) had targeted 13- to 17-year-olds with ads when they were feeling down or depressed. "It could identify when they were feeling worthless or helpless or like a failure, and [Meta] would take that information and share it with advertisers," Wynn-Williams told the senators on the subcommittee for crime and terrorism. "Advertisers understand that when people don't feel good about themselves, it's often a good time to pitch a product – people are more likely to buy something." She said the company was letting advertisers know when the teens were depressed so they could be served an ad at the best time. As an example, she suggested that if a teen girl deleted a selfie, advertisers might see that as a good time to sell her a beauty product as she may not be feeling great about her appearance. They also targeted teens with ads for weight loss when young girls had concerns around body confidence. If Meta was willing to target teens based on their emotional states, it stands to reason they'd do the same to adults. One document displayed during the hearing showed an example of just that.

Note: Facebook hid its own internal research for years showing that Instagram worsened body image issues, revealing that 13% of British teenage girls reported more frequent suicidal thoughts after using the app. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and mental health.

Digital Driver's Licenses Could Make "Surveillance Pricing" Much Easier for Companies

There has been a surge of concern and interest in the threat of "surveillance pricing," in which companies leverage the enormous amount of detailed data they increasingly hold on their customers to set individualized prices for each of them – likely in ways that benefit the companies and hurt their customers. The central battle in such efforts will be around identity: do the companies whose prices you are checking or negotiating know who you are? Can you stop them from knowing who you are? Unfortunately, one day not too far in the future, you may lose the ability to do so. Many states around the country are creating digital versions of their state driver's licenses. Digital versions of IDs allow people to be tracked in ways that are not possible or practical with physical IDs – especially since they are being designed to work ... online. It will be much easier for companies to request – and eventually demand – that people share their IDs in order to engage in all manner of transactions. It will make it easier for companies to collect data about us, merge it with other data, and analyze it, all with high confidence that it pertains to the same person – and then recognize us ... and execute their price-maximizing strategy against us. Not only would digital IDs prevent people from escaping surveillance pricing, but surveillance pricing would simultaneously incentivize companies to force the presentation of digital IDs by people who want to shop.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on corporate corruption and the disappearance of privacy.

The Big Tech Deep State

Digital technology was sold as a liberating tool that could free individuals from state power. Yet the state security apparatus always had a different view. The Prism leaks by whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 revealed a deep and almost unconditional cooperation between Silicon Valley firms and security apparatuses of the state such as the National Security Agency (NSA). People realized that basically any message exchanged via Big Tech firms including Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, etc. could be easily spied upon with direct backdoor access: a form of mass surveillance with few precedents ... especially in nominally democratic states. The leaks prompted outrage, but eventually most people preferred to look away. The most extreme case is the surveillance and intelligence firm Palantir. Its service is fundamentally to provide a more sophisticated version of the mass surveillance that the Snowden leaks revealed. In particular, it endeavors to support the military and police as they aim to identify and track various targets – sometimes literal human targets. Palantir is a company whose very business is to support the security state in its most brutal manifestations: in military operations that lead to massive loss of life, including of civilians, and in brutal immigration enforcement [in] the United States. Unfortunately, Palantir is but one part of a much broader military-information complex, which is becoming the axis of the new Big Tech Deep State.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on corruption in the intelligence community and in Big Tech.

How AI and surveillance capitalism are undermining democracy

AI's promise of behavior prediction and control fuels a vicious cycle of surveillance which inevitably triggers abuses of power. The problem with using data to make predictions is that the process can be used as a weapon against society, threatening democratic values. As the lines between private and public data are blurred in modern society, many won't realize that their private lives are becoming data points used to make decisions about them. What AI does is make this a surveillance ratchet, a device that only goes in one direction, which goes something like this: To make the inferences I want to make to learn more about you, I must collect more data on you. For my AI tools to run, I need data about a lot of you. And once I've collected this data, I can monetize it by selling it to others who want to use AI to make other inferences about you. AI creates a demand for data but also becomes the result of collecting data. What makes AI prediction both powerful and lucrative is being able to control what happens next. If a bank can claim to predict what people will do with a loan, it can use that to decide whether they should get one. If an admissions officer can claim to predict how students will perform in college, they can use that to decide which students to admit. Amazon's Echo devices have been subject to warrants for the audio recordings made by the device inside our homes–recordings that were made even when the people present weren't talking directly to the device. The desire to surveil is bipartisan. It's about power, not party politics.

Note: As journalist Kenan Malik put it, "It is not AI but our blindness to the way human societies are already deploying machine intelligence for political ends that should most worry us." Read about the shadowy companies tracking and trading your personal data, which isn't just used to sell products. It's often accessed by governments, law enforcement, and intelligence agencies, often without warrants or oversight. For more, read our concise summaries of news articles on AI.

The Government's Growing Trove of Social Media Data

Reviewing individuals' social media to conduct ideological vetting has been a defining initiative of President Trump's second term. As part of that effort, the administration has proposed expanding the mandatory collection of social media identifiers. By linking individuals' online presence to government databases, officials could more easily identify, monitor, and penalize people based on their online self-expression, raising the risk of self-censorship. Most recently, the State Department issued a cable directing consular officers to review the social media of all student visa applicants for "any indications of hostility towards the citizens, culture, government, institutions or founding principles of the United States," as well as for any "history of political activism." This builds on earlier efforts this term, including the State Department's "Catch and Revoke" program, which promised to leverage artificial intelligence to screen visa holders' social media for ostensible "pro-Hamas" activity, and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services' April announcement that it would begin looking for "antisemitic activity" in the social media of scores of foreign nationals. At the border, any traveler, regardless of citizenship status, may face additional scrutiny. U.S. border agents are authorized to ... examine phones, computers, and other devices to review posts and private messages on social media, even if they do not suspect any involvement in criminal activity or have immigration-related concerns.

Note: Our news archives on censorship and the disappearance of privacy reveal how government surveillance of social media has long been conducted by all presidential administrations and all levels of government.

Data Brokers Are Hiding Their Opt-Out Pages From Google Search

Data brokers are required by California law to provide ways for consumers to request their data be deleted. But good luck finding them. More than 30 of the companies, which collect and sell consumers' personal information, hid their deletion instructions from Google. This creates one more obstacle for consumers who want to delete their data. Data brokers nationwide must register in California under the state's Consumer Privacy Act, which allows Californians to request that their information be removed, that it not be sold, or that they get access to it. After reviewing the websites of all 499 data brokers registered with the state, we found 35 had code to stop certain pages from showing up in searches. While those companies might be fulfilling the letter of the law by providing a page consumers can use to delete their data, it means little if those consumers can't find the page, according to Matthew Schwartz, a policy analyst. "This sounds to me like a clever work-around to make it as hard as possible for consumers to find it," Schwartz said. Some companies that hid their privacy instructions from search engines included a small link at the bottom of their homepage. Accessing it often required scrolling multiple screens, dismissing pop-ups for cookie permissions and newsletter sign-ups, then finding a link that was a fraction the size of other text on the page. So consumers still faced a serious hurdle when trying to get their information deleted.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

The Secret History of Tor: How a Military Project Became a Lifeline for Privacy

Tor is mostly known as the Dark Web or Dark Net, seen as an online Wild West where crime runs rampant. Yet it's partly funded by the U.S. government, and the BBC and Facebook both have Tor-only versions to allow users in authoritarian countries to reach them. At its simplest, Tor is a distributed digital infrastructure that makes you anonymous online. It is a network of servers spread around the world, accessed using a browser called the Tor Browser, which you can download for free from the Tor Project website. When you use the Tor Browser, your signals are encrypted and bounced around the world before they reach the service you're trying to access. This makes it difficult for governments to trace your activity or block access, as the network just routes you through a country where that access isn't restricted. But, because you can't protect yourself from digital crime without also protecting yourself from mass surveillance by the state, these technologies are the site of constant battles between security and law enforcement interests. The state's claim to protect the vulnerable often masks efforts to exert control. In fact, robust, well-funded, value-driven and democratically accountable content moderation – by well-paid workers with good conditions – is a far better solution than magical tech fixes to social problems ... or surveillance tools. As more of our online lives are funneled into the centralized AI infrastructures ... tools like Tor are becoming ever more important.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

When Your Power Meter Becomes a Tool of Mass Surveillance

In California, the law explicitly protects the privacy of power customers, prohibiting public utilities from disclosing precise "smart" meter data in most cases. Despite this, Sacramento's power company and law enforcement agencies have been running an illegal mass surveillance scheme for years, using our power meters as home-mounted spies. For a decade, the Sacramento Municipal Utilities District (SMUD) has been searching through all of its customers' energy data, and passed on more than 33,000 tips about supposedly "high" usage households to police. Ostensibly looking for homes that were growing illegal amounts of cannabis, SMUD analysts have admitted that such "high" power usage could come from houses using air conditioning or heat pumps or just being large. And the threshold of so-called "suspicion" has steadily dropped, from 7,000 kWh per month in 2014 to just 2,800 kWh a month in 2023. This scheme has targeted Asian customers. SMUD analysts deemed one home suspicious because it was "4k [kWh], Asian," and another suspicious because "multiple Asians have reported there." Sacramento police sent accusatory letters in English and Chinese, but no other language, to residents who used above-average amounts of electricity. Last week, we filed our main brief explaining how this surveillance program violates the law and why it must be stopped. This type of dragnet surveillance ... is inherently unreasonable.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on police corruption and the disappearance of privacy.

Border Patrol Wants Advanced AI to Spy on American Cities

U.S. Customs and Border Protection, flush with billions in new funding, is seeking "advanced AI" technologies to surveil urban residential areas, increasingly sophisticated autonomous systems, and even the ability to see through walls. A CBP presentation for an "Industry Day" summit with private sector vendors ... lays out a detailed wish list of tech CBP hopes to purchase. State-of-the-art, AI-augmented surveillance technologies will be central to the Trump administration's anti-immigrant campaign, which will extend deep into the interior of the North American continent. [A] reference to AI-aided urban surveillance appears on a page dedicated to the operational needs of Border Patrol's "Coastal AOR," or area of responsibility, encompassing the entire southeast of the United States. "In the best of times, oversight of technology and data at DHS is weak and has allowed profiling, but in recent months the administration has intentionally further undermined DHS accountability," explained [Spencer Reynolds, a former attorney with the Department of Homeland Security]. "Artificial intelligence development is opaque, even more so when it relies on private contractors that are unaccountable to the public – like those Border Patrol wants to hire. Injecting AI into an environment full of biased data and black-box intelligence systems will likely only increase risk and further embolden the agency's increasingly aggressive behavior."

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on AI and immigration enforcement corruption.

Spies for hire used â€Big Brother' tactics on salmon farm activists

Wildlife activists who exposed horrific conditions at Scottish salmon farms were subjected to "Big Brother" surveillance by spies for hire working for an elite British army veteran. One of the activists believes he was with his young daughter ... when he was followed and photographed by the former paratrooper Damian Ozenbrook's operatives. The surveillance of [Corin] Smith and another wildlife activist, Don Staniford, began after they paddled out to some of the floating cages where millions of salmon are farmed every year ... and filmed what was happening inside. The footage, posted online and broadcast by the BBC in 2018, showed fish crawling with sea lice. Covert surveillance by state agencies is subject to legislation that includes independent oversight. But once highly trained operatives leave the police, military or intelligence services, the private firms that deploy them are barely regulated. Guy Vassall-Adams KC, a barrister who has worked for the targets of surveillance, including anti-asbestos activists infiltrated by private spies, believes these private firms "engage in highly intrusive investigations which often involve serious infringements of privacy." He added. "It's a wild west." One firm, run by a former special forces pilot, was found to have infiltrated Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and other environmental groups for corporate clients in the 2000s. Another, reportedly founded by an ex-MI6 officer, was hired in 2019 by BP to spy on climate campaigners.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on factory farming and the disappearance of privacy.

The Movement to Protect Your Mind From Brain-Computer Technologies

Recording memories, reading thoughts, and manipulating what another person sees through a device in their brain may seem like science fiction plots about a distant and troubled future. But a team of multi-disciplinary researchers say the first steps to inventing these technologies have already arrived. Through a concept called "neuro rights," they want to put in place safeguards for our most precious biological possessions: our mind. Headlining this growing effort today is the NeuroRights Initiative, formed by Columbia University neuroscientist Rafael Yuste. Their proposition is to stay ahead of the tech by convincing governments across the world to create "neuro rights" legal protections, in line with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a document announced by the United Nations in 1948 as the standard for rights that should be universally protected for all people. Neuro rights advocates propose five additions to this standard: the rights to personal identity, free will, mental privacy, equal access to mental augmentation, and protection from algorithmic bias. "This is a new frontier of privacy rights, in that the things that are inside of our heads are ours. They're intimate; we share them when we want to share them. And we don't want that to be made into a data field for experience," said Sara Goering, professor of philosophy and co-lead for the Neuroethics Group for the Center of Neurotechnology at University of Washington.

Note: Watch a new documentary titled, "Cognitive Liberty: Neuroweapons and the Fight for Brain Privacy." For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and mind control.

Data Collection Can Be Effective AND Legal

Technology already available – and already demonstrated to be effective – makes it possible for law-abiding officials, together with experienced technical people to create a highly efficient system in which both security and privacy can be assured. Advanced technology can pinpoint and thwart corruption in the intelligence, military, and civilian domain. At its core, this requires automated analysis of attributes and transactional relationships among individuals. The large data sets in government files already contain the needed data. On the Intelligence Community side, there are ways to purge databases of irrelevant data and deny government officials the ability to spy on anyone they want. These methodologies protect the privacy of innocent people, while enhancing the ability to discover criminal threats. In order to ensure continuous legal compliance with these changes, it is necessary to establish a central technical group or organization to continuously monitor and validate compliance with the Constitution and U.S. law. Such a group would need to have the highest-level access to all agencies to ensure compliance behind the classification doors. It must be able to go into any agency to inspect its activity at any time. In addition ... it would be best to make government financial and operational transactions open to the public for review. Such an organization would go a long way toward making government truly transparent to the public.

Note: The article cites national security journalist James Risen's book on how the creation of Google was closely tied to NSA and CIA-backed efforts to privatize surveillance infrastructure. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

Hundreds of data brokers might be breaking state laws, say privacy advocate

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and a nonprofit privacy rights group have called on several states to investigate why "hundreds" of data brokers haven't registered with state consumer protection agencies in accordance with local laws. An analysis done in collaboration with Privacy Rights Clearinghouse (PRC) found that many data brokers have failed to register in all of the four states with laws that require it, preventing consumers in some states from learning what kinds of information these brokers collect and how to opt out. Data brokers are companies that collect and sell troves of personal information about people, including their names, addresses, phone numbers, financial information, and more. Consumers have little control over this information, posing serious privacy concerns, and attempts to address these concerns at a federal level have mostly failed. Four states – California, Texas, Oregon, and Vermont – do attempt to regulate these companies by requiring them to register with consumer protection agencies and share details about what kind of data they collect. In letters to the states' attorneys general, the EFF and PRC say they "uncovered a troubling pattern" after scraping data broker registries. They found that many data brokers didn't consistently register their businesses across all four states. The number of data brokers that appeared on one registry but not another includes 524 in Texas, 475 in Oregon, 309 in Vermont, and 291 in California.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

How AI-Powered Police Forces Watch Your Every Move

From facial recognition to predictive analytics to the rise of increasingly convincing deepfakes and other synthetic video, new technologies are emerging faster than agencies, lawmakers, or watchdog groups can keep up. Take New Orleans, where, for the past two years, police officers have quietly received real-time alerts from a private network of AI-equipped cameras, flagging the whereabouts of people on wanted lists. In 2022, City Council members attempted to put guardrails on the use of facial recognition. But those guidelines assume it's the police doing the searching. New Orleans police have hundreds of cameras, but the alerts in question came from a separate system: a network of 200 cameras equipped with facial recognition and installed by residents and businesses on private property, feeding video to a nonprofit called Project NOLA. Police officers who downloaded the group's app then received notifications when someone on a wanted list was detected on the camera network, along with a location. That has civil liberties groups and defense attorneys in Louisiana frustrated. "When you make this a private entity, all those guardrails that are supposed to be in place for law enforcement and prosecution are no longer there, and we don't have the tools to ... hold people accountable," Danny Engelberg, New Orleans' chief public defender, [said]. Another way departments can skirt facial recognition rules is to use AI analysis that doesn't technically rely on faces.

Note: Learn about all the high-tech tools police use to surveil protestors. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on AI and police corruption.

How illicit markets fueled by data breaches sell your personal information to criminals

When National Public Data, a company that does online background checks, was breached in 2024, criminals gained the names, addresses, dates of birth and national identification numbers such as Social Security numbers of 170 million people in the U.S., U.K. and Canada. The same year, hackers who targeted Ticketmaster stole the financial information and personal data of more than 560 million customers. In so-called stolen data markets, hackers sell personal information they illegally obtain to others, who then use the data to engage in fraud and theft for profit. Every piece of personal data captured in a data breach – a passport number, Social Security number or login for a shopping service – has inherent value. Offenders can ... assume someone else's identity, make a fraudulent purchase or steal services such as streaming media or music. Some vendors also offer distinct products such as credit reports, Social Security numbers and login details for different paid services. The price for pieces of information varies. A recent analysis found credit card data sold for US$50 on average, while Walmart logins sold for $9. However, the pricing can vary widely across vendors and markets. The rate of return can be exceptional. An offender who buys 100 cards for $500 can recoup costs if only 20 of those cards are active and can be used to make an average purchase of $30. The result is that data breaches are likely to continue as long as there is demand.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech and the disappearance of privacy.

newsarticles.media: Privacy News

Palantir CEO Says Legalizing War Crimes Would Be Good for Business

Blackwater Successor Hunts Immigrants for ICE

Spycops sent thousands of surveillance reports to MI5, inquiry documents reveal

Governments Are Pushing Digital IDs. Are You Ready To Be Tracked?

Military contractors reap big profits in war-to-homeland pipeline

The Private Companies Quietly Building a Police State

The Privacy Battle in Our Brains

Intimate Advertising, the Next Frontier in AI Manipulation

How Cops Are Using Flock Safety's ALPR Network to Surveil Protesters and Activists

DARPA Going Hard on Insect-Sized Spy Robots

Scientists Working on "Smart Dust" That Can Spy on a Room While Drifting Through the Air

The Rise of the Thielverse and the Construction of the Surveillance State

â€Surveillance pricing': Why you might be paying more than your neighbour

Billionaire Larry Ellison says a vast AI-fueled surveillance system can ensure 'citizens will be on their best behavior'

Alex Karp Insists Palantir Doesn't Spy on Americans. Here's What He's Not Saying.

Meta whistleblower Sarah Wynn-Williams says company targeted ads at teens based on their â€emotional state'

Digital Driver's Licenses Could Make "Surveillance Pricing" Much Easier for Companies

The Big Tech Deep State

How AI and surveillance capitalism are undermining democracy

The Government's Growing Trove of Social Media Data

Data Brokers Are Hiding Their Opt-Out Pages From Google Search

The Secret History of Tor: How a Military Project Became a Lifeline for Privacy

When Your Power Meter Becomes a Tool of Mass Surveillance

Border Patrol Wants Advanced AI to Spy on American Cities

Spies for hire used â€Big Brother' tactics on salmon farm activists

The Movement to Protect Your Mind From Brain-Computer Technologies

Data Collection Can Be Effective AND Legal

Hundreds of data brokers might be breaking state laws, say privacy advocate

How AI-Powered Police Forces Watch Your Every Move

How illicit markets fueled by data breaches sell your personal information to criminals

â€Surveillance pricing': Why you might be paying more than your neighbour

Meta whistleblower Sarah Wynn-Williams says company targeted ads at teens based on their â€emotional state'

Spies for hire used â€Big Brother' tactics on salmon farm activists