Politics
Venezuela is losing a generation of tech talent to its humanitarian crisis
The crisis in Venezuela has seen sky-high inflation, widespread hunger and a large-scale exodus from the country. The impact has been generational and is no different when applied to its…
Senators demand to know why election vendors still sell voting machines with ‘known vulnerabilities’
Four senior senators have called on the largest U.S. voting machine makers to explain why they continue to sell devices with “known vulnerabilities,” ahead of upcoming critical elections. The letter,…
Featured Article
The responsibility for a sustainable digital future
On March 12, 2019, we celebrate the 30th anniversary of the “World Wide Web,” Tim Berners-Lee’s ground-breaking invention.
Amazon reportedly nixes its price parity requirement for third-party sellers in the US
Amazon will stop forbidding third-party merchants who list on its e-commerce platform in the United States from selling the same products on other sites for lower prices, reports Axios. The…
Reddit says government data requests more than doubled in 2018
Reddit has said the number of government requests for user data more than doubled in 2018 than on the previous year. The news and content sharing site said in its…
Saudi Arabia denies involvement in leak of Jeff Bezos’ private messages
In his extraordinary Medium post last week accusing American Media Inc. of “extortion and blackmail,” Jeff Bezos hinted (but did not explicitly state) that there may be a connection between…
Congress needs your input (but don’t call it crowdsourcing)
Like many modern digital innovations, “crowdsourcing” is a concept borrowed from the commercial tech industry.
Politiscope, an app to track Congressional voting records and bills, launches on Android devices
Last September, two former National Football League players launched an app called Politiscope to track the voting records of members of Congress and the bills that they were introducing —…
Featured Article
All your meme are belong to AOC
Memes are the new vernacular of political culture and we dismiss them at our own peril. Liberals learned this the hard way late in the presidential campaign, when they began realizing how deftly the alt-right was able to use viral jokes, hashtags, and images as a propaganda tool, often to bolster white supremacist ideology. The phenomenon…
Democratic texting platform Hustle lays off a big chunk of its staff
The company behind a texting platform that powered more than 1,300 Democratic campaigns has slashed its staff in the lull following the 2018 midterms. Hustle co-founder and CEO Roddy Lindsay,…
President Bolsonaro should boost Brazil’s entrepreneurial ecosystem
In late October following a significant victory for Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil’s presidential elections, the stock market for Latin America’s largest country shot up. Financial markets reacted favorably to the…
Vietnam threatens to penalize Facebook for breaking its draconian cybersecurity law
Well, that didn’t take long. We’re less than 10 days into 2019 and already Vietnam is aiming threats at Facebook for violating its draconian cybersecurity law, which came into force…
In revamped transparency report, Apple reveals uptick in demands for user data
Apple’s transparency report just got a lot more — well, transparent. For years, the technology giant released a twice-a-year report on the number of government demands it received. It wasn’t…
How to stream U.S. elections coverage if you don’t have TV
You don’t need a TV to tune in to live coverage of the U.S. elections results today – and you don’t have to have Hulu or another live TV streaming…
Facebook’s Ad Archive Report highlights top political spenders
For obvious reasons, Facebook’s looking to up political advertising transparency ahead of the midterms. Back in May, the social network introduced Ad Archive, a searchable database of political ads in…
In State Tectonics, an explosive ending for the future of democracy
An omnipotent data infrastructure and knowledge-sharing tech organization has spread across the planet. Global conspiracies to disseminate propaganda and rig elections are ever present. Algorithms determine what people see as…
Trump administration sues California over its brand-new net neutrality law
The Department of Justice announced on Sunday that it has filed a lawsuit against California to block its new net neutrality law, just hours after it was signed by governor…
Google CEO Sundar Pichai will reportedly meet with Republican lawmakers this week
Google CEO Sundar Pichai will meet in private with Republican lawmakers on Friday to discuss issues including its work in China and alleged political bias, reports the Wall Street Journal.…
Economist Tyler Cowen launches a fellowship and grant program for moon shot ideas
Tyler Cowen, who I interviewed here, is a fascinating economist. Part pragmatist and part dreamer, he has been researching and writing about the future for a long time in books…
Former Facebook security chief says creating election chaos is still easy
As someone who’s had a years-long front-row seat to Russia’s efforts to influence U.S. politics, former Facebook Chief Security Officer Alex Stamos has a pretty solid read on what we…
How to watch Facebook and Twitter’s big hearings with Congress
On Wednesday, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey will appear before Congress in the latest high profile hearings for tech on Capitol Hill. The main event will…
Google denies Trump’s claim that it did not promote his State of the Union address
Google is pushing back against a claim by Donald Trump that the search engine stopped promoting State of the Union livestreams on its homepage after his presidency began. Trump’s claim…
Valimail offers US election boards, campaigns and voting vendors its email anti-spoofing service for free
Valimail, an enterprise email security firm, announced that it will offer its email protections for free to relevant government workers and campaigns through the 2018 midterms. That offer covers state…
Twitter suspends more accounts for “engaging in coordinated manipulation”
Following last week’s suspension of 284 accounts for “engaging in coordinated manipulation,” Twitter announced today that it’s kicked an additional 486 accounts off the platform for the same reason, bringing…
Google releases a searchable database of US political ads
In an effort to provide more transparency and deliver on a promise to Congress, Google just published an archive of political ads that have run on its platform. Google’s new…
The DNC’s lawyers subpoena WikiLeaks with a tweet
In a very unusual move, WikiLeaks has been subpoenaed via Twitter. In a tweet on Friday, a law firm representing the Democratic National Convention in its civil lawsuit against WikiLeaks…
Activists push back on Facebook’s decision to remove a DC protest event
A number of activists and organizers in the Washington, DC area are disputing Facebook’s decision to remove a counter-protest event for a rally organized by Jason Kessler, the white nationalist figure…
Twitter says it does not shadow ban, despite complaints by Republicans
After President Donald Trump accused Twitter of “shadow banning” prominent Republicans, the company denied that it uses the practice, in which someone’s posts are made invisible or undiscoverable without them…
Outvote hopes to flip elections by getting Democrats to text their friends
Outvote, a new Y Combinator-backed startup, wants to make grassroots-style campaigning easier and more personal, with the launch of an app that allows people to text their friends with reminders…
Russian indictments show that the US needs federal oversight of election security
President Trump’s Helsinki summit with Vladimir Putin, on the heels of 12 Russian intelligence officials indicted for hacking the 2016 election, made it clear that this administration has zero commitment to protect…
