Monthly archives: February, 2026

A community organizer’s guide to Signal group chats

The Verge – Key privacy settings and best practices. “With ICE and CBP roaming the streets, united community action is more important than ever right now — from local mutual aid groups to school safety patrols. Known for its privacy features and end-to-end encryption, the Signal messaging app has become a popular platform for organizing …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, E-Records, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research

Nearly Half of Americans in 2025 Believed False Claims Across Seven Months of Surveys

NewsGuard: “Belief in False Claims Averaged 46 Percent in 2025. Over the first seven months of Reality Gap Index reports — from June to December 2025 — NewsGuard found that an average of nearly half of Americans believed at least one false claim about major claims spreading in the news. For the first six months …

Subjects: AI, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Search Engines, Social Media

Accountability for ICE and CBP

Follow up to CBP Murdered Alex Jeffrey Pretti in Minneapolis MN on January 24, 2026 [Note – Two CBP Agents Identified in Alex Pretti Shooting. The two federal immigration agents who fired on Minneapolis protester Alex Pretti are identified in government records as Border Patrol agent Jesus Ochoa and Customs and Border Protection officer Raymundo …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, Congress, Government Documents, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Legislation

How Data Brokers Can Fuel Violence Against Public Servants

Wired [no paywall]: “A new report from the Public Service Alliance finds state privacy laws offer public servants few ways to protect their private data, even as threats against them are on the rise…A new report published Tuesday finds that while violent threats to public servants across the US have been increasing, “comprehensive” state-level consumer …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, E-Records, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Privacy

How “95%” escaped into the world and why so many believed it

Exponential View: “One number still keeps turning up in speeches, board meetings, my conversations and inbox: “95 percent.” Do I need to say more than that? OK, here’s another clue: this number traveled on borrowed authority in 2025, rarely with a footnote and it started to shape decisions. The claim is this: “95 percent” of …

Subjects: AI, Economy, Education, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research

ChatGPT isn’t the only chatbot pulling answers from Elon Musk’s Grokipedia

The Verge: “Google’s Gemini, AI Mode, and AI Overviews, Perplexity, and Microsoft are starting to cite Musk’s Wikipedia knockoff…ChatGPT is using Grokipedia as a source, and it’s not the only AI tool to do so. Citations to Elon Musk’s AI-generated encyclopedia are starting to appear in answers from Google’s AI Overviews, AI Mode, and Gemini, …

Subjects: Education, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Search Engines, Social Media

The Library of Congress at a Crossroads: Executive Overreach and the Future of Public Knowledge

Street, Leslie and Runyon, Amanda, The Library of Congress at a Crossroads: Executive Overreach and the Future of Public Knowledge (January 25, 2026). U of Penn Law School, Public Law Research Paper No. 26-07, Seattle University Law Review Online & Seattle Journal of Technology, Environment, & Innovation Law, forthcoming, 2026, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=6155010 or …

Subjects: Congress, Copyright, Courts, Education, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Legislation, Libraries

Attacks against the International Criminal Court: Who cares about victims of atrocity crimes?

Via LLRX – Attacks against the International Criminal Court: Who cares about victims of atrocity crimes? The attacks against the ICC are part of a wholesale U.S. assault on international legal norms and institutions since the 20 January 2025 inauguration of President Donald J. Trump. Exactly a year later, Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney made …

Subjects: Civil Liberties, Courts, Defense, Economy, Government Documents, Legal Research

AI in Finance and Banking, January 31, 2026

Via LLRX – AI in Finance and Banking, January 31, 2026 – This semi-monthly column by Sabrina I. Pacifici highlights news, government documents, NGO/IGO papers, conferences, industry white papers and reports, academic papers and speeches, and central bank actions on the subject of AI’s fast paced impact on the banking and finance sectors. The chronological links …

Subjects: AI, Education, Financial System, Legal Research, Legislation

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, January 31, 2026

Via LLRX – Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, January 31, 2026 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly …

Subjects: AI, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, E-Mail, E-Records, Internet, Privacy, Search Engines, Social Media

White House Scraps ‘Burdensome’ Software Security Rules 

Security Week – “Two Biden-era memorandums have been revoked, but some of the resources they provide can still be used by government organizations.  The White House has announced that software security guidance issued during the Biden administration has been rescinded due to “unproven and burdensome” requirements that prioritized administrative compliance over meaningful security investments. The …

Subjects: AI, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, E-Government, E-Mail, E-Records, Government Documents

How often do AI chatbots lead users down a harmful path?

Ars Technica: “At this point, we’ve all heard plenty of stories about AI chatbots leading users to harmful actions, harmful beliefs, or simply incorrect information. Despite the prevalence of these stories, though, it’s hard to know just how often users are being manipulated. Are these tales of AI harms anecdotal outliers or signs of a …

Subjects: AI, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Search Engines