Mastodawn

Trump admin hounds Reddit to reveal identity of user who criticized ICE
Trump admin reportedly gets grand jury involved in attempt to identify Redditor.
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/04/trump-admin-hounds-reddit-to-reveal-identity-of-user-who-criticized-ice/?utm_brand=arstechnica&utm_social-type=owned&utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social

existential-cyber-char 3d ago

Andrea Junker

5d ago

Dear American citizens, whatever you wish more German citizens would have done in 1933, do that now.

existential-cyber-char 3d ago

Show thread

Wolfie Christl 3d ago

Penlink claims that Webloc doesn't process age, gender & ad targeting categories anymore today but 'merely' location records tied to device identifiers.

Location data can reveal a person's home, workplace, family, friends, habits, interests and more. Misusing it for government surveillance is highly problematic.

Another 2021 screen shows how Webloc displays location records in Street View, all of them possibly associated with a person who was frequently located in front of a certain house.

existential-cyber-char Apr 4

Hacker News Mar 21

Blocking Internet Archive Won't Stop AI, but Will Erase Web's Historical Record
L: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/03/blocking-internet-archive-wont-stop-ai-it-will-erase-webs-historical-record
C: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47464818
posted on 2026.03.21 at 03:30:16 (c=0, p=4)

Blocking the Internet Archive Won’t Stop AI, But It Will Erase the Web’s Historical Record

Imagine a newspaper publisher announcing it will no longer allow libraries to keep copies of its paper. That’s effectively what’s begun happening online in the last few months. The Internet Archive—the world’s largest digital library—has preserved newspapers since it went online in the mid-1990s....

Electronic Frontier Foundation

existential-cyber-char Mar 8

kim_harding ✅Mar 8

Americans aren’t facing a democratic collapse. We’re living in its aftermath
https://www.theguardian.com/global/commentisfree/2026/mar/08/trump-democracy-oligarchy-policy
The US was an oligarchy well before tRump’s first term. Recognizing this reality is essential to building a true democracy

Americans aren’t facing a democratic collapse. We’re living in its aftermath

The US was an oligarchy well before Trump’s first term. Recognizing this reality is essential to building a true democracy

The Guardian

existential-cyber-char Mar 8

Anna Anthro Mar 8

It Can Now Be Plainly Said: #Trump Is Planning a November Coup d’État

https://newrepublic.com/post/207138/trump-coup-detat-midterm-elections

It Can Now Be Plainly Said: Trump Is Planning a November Coup d’État

During the campaign, it was kind of hard to picture the specifics of how Trump might pull such a thing off. Alas, it’s getting less hypothetical by the week.

The New Republic

existential-cyber-char Mar 8

Harold Jarche Mar 8

"the real existential risk is that we are literally leading to the overconsumption of our planet. We are leading to the enormous exploitation of labor in the production of these technologies as well as the application of these technologies and the economic fallout that it could have when it starts to automate away a lot of people’s jobs, and we are allowing the tech industry to consolidate this extraordinary degree of resources unlike anything ever before."

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/10/openai-chatgpt-sam-altman-artificial-intelligence-karen-hao/

#AI

The race to stop AI’s threats to democracy

On this week’s “More To The Story,” tech journalist Karen Hao sounds the alarm about the rising risks to the country—and planet—from the growth of artificial intelligence.

Mother Jones

existential-cyber-char Mar 6

LibreOffice Mar 6

Millions of students are getting locked into closed, proprietary software from Big Tech vendors. Here's how #LibreOffice can give them back their digital sovereignty: https://blog.documentfoundation.org/blog/2026/03/06/libreoffice-for-education-regaining-digital-sovereignty/ #foss #openSource #freesoftware

existential-cyber-char Mar 6

Phil Plait Mar 6

Elon Musk has already started plans to launch a million satellites.

Yes. A MILLION.

This is a colossally bad idea, and it's not too late to make your voice heard. I explain everything:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/rampant-growth-of-satellite-mega-constellations-could-ruin-the-night-sky/

Rampant growth of satellite mega constellations could ruin the night sky

Satellites are wonders of modern technology that have improved all of our lives. But having more than a million of them in orbit could destroy our view of the heavens and seriously damage our planet

Scientific American

existential-cyber-char Mar 6

Privacy International Mar 6

The United States government and huge AI companies are using your data as part of the war machine.

Their ethics have been breached. The red lines have been crossed.

https://privacyinternational.org/news-analysis/5744/what-does-it-mean-when-big-tech-goes-war

What does it mean when Big Tech goes to war?

AI firms are still struggling to work with the US Department of War/Defence. OpenAI is grappling with its own contract with the U.S.

Privacy International