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Removing Bad Actors on Facebook
We removed 32 Pages and accounts from Facebook and Instagram because they were involved in coordinated inauthentic behavior.
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EFF to Texas AG: Epson Tricked Its Customers with a Dangerous Fake Update
If you've ever bought an inkjet printer, you know just how much the manufacturers charge for ink (more than vintage Champagne!) and you may also know that you can avoid those sky-high prices by buying third-party inks, or refilled cartridges, or kits to refill your own cartridges.The major printer...
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UK intelligence agency admits unlawfully spying on Privacy International
Thames House, Offices of MI5. Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons
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Australia’s Proposed Surveillance Laws Will Break the Trust Tech Depends On
In the last few years, we’ve discovered just how much trust — whether we like it or not — we have all been obliged to place in modern technology. Third-party software, of unknown composition and security, runs on everything around us: from the phones we carry around, to the smart devices with...
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No funding for uncomfortable results
Latanya Sweeney blew the whistle on how easy supposedly de-identified data could be re-identified. Her results were not well received.
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The Firefox Dilemma
Consider whether we're advocating for Firefox in the right way, on the right grounds.
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On Cash
What happened was, I was walking through a train station on the way to work with the buds playing randomly on shuffle and a knifeblade of Real Music came in from outside so I had to pull them out of my ears, there was this young dude getting great electric sound out of a teeny amp doing a slow take on Little Wing with…
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AT&T, Time Warner, and the Need for Neutrality
It is no surprise that a judge allowed the AT&T-Time Warner acquisition to proceed given the government’s poor case; the question is if a better case could have been made. What is ultima…
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Spain will soon overtake Japan in life expectancy rankings
Spain is forecast to topple Japan from the top spot in the longest life expectancy league table by 2040, while the US continues to slip down the rankings.
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Vitamins for convicts could save taxpayers' money
(OMNS Dec 20, 2017) I used to teach college courses in jail. No, not as an inmate. As an adjunct professor.
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Crowdfunding Backer Patented My Project
I never thought about patents much. I just wanted to make stuff and share it with others. Then one day someone else patented my work.
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Startup Won't Give in to Motivational Health Messaging's $35k Patent Demand
Trying to succeed as a startup is hard enough. Getting a frivolous patent infringement demand letter in the mail can make it a whole lot harder. The experience of San Francisco-based Motiv is the latest example of how patent trolls impose painful costs on small startups and stifle innovation. Motiv...
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Why parking minimums almost destroyed my town and how we repealed them (2017)
Plus 5 tips for repealing parking minimums in your community.
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Problems coming for online publishing
Let’s start with Facebook’s Surveillance Machine, by Zeynep Tufekci in last Monday’s New York Times. Among other things (all correct), Zeynep explains that “Facebook makes m…
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A female engineer's opinion on why there are fewer women in tech
Over the last several months, I've witnessed many controversial discussions among my friends, in my San Francisco community, and on online forums about James Demore’s memorandum [https://gizmodo.com/exclusive-heres-the-full-10-page-anti-diversity-screed-1797564320] . People of both genders are wrestling with the fact…
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Clearing Up a Few Things About Facebook’s Partners
We're facing questions about whether Facebook gave large tech companies access to people's information and, if so, why we did this.
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TSA announces “biometrics vision for all commercial aviation travelers”
Today the US Transportation Security Administration released a detailed TSA Biometric Roadmap for Aviation Security & the Passenger Experience , making explicit the goal of requiring mug shots (to be used for automated facial recognition and image-based surveillance and control) as a condition of all domestic or…