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The Atlas of Surveillance – Documenting Police Tech in Our Communities with Open Source Research. “Explore 12,810 datapoints in the U.S. collected by hundreds of researchers. Last updated 7/15/25. TOGGLE the Legend to reveal how technology is spreading. ZOOM into any region to see the technologies in detail. If an area has no markers, it …
Wired – no paywall: “A new agreement viewed by WIRED gives ICE direct access to a federal database containing sensitive medical data on tens of millions of Americans, with the goal of locating immigrants. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials are getting access to the personal data of nearly 80 million people on Medicaid in order …
Digital Digging: “People ask AI chatbots for facts while Google chases AI with generative summaries—both approaches can be unreliable. This guide explains when to Google, when to chat, and how to combine them so you research faster while avoiding embarrassing errors. The blurring lines: The choice between “search” and “AI” is becoming less clear-cut as …
Read Free via archived articles by WSJ – “Dozens of Jeffrey Epstein’s friends sent him bawdy letters for a 50th birthday album. One was from Donald Trump. The letter bearing Trump’s name, which was reviewed by WSJ, contains several lines of typewritten text framed by the outline of a naked woman. Pages from the album—collected …
The Atlantic – no paywall – The Razor-Thin Line Between Conspiracy Theory and Actual Conspiracy – “A conversation with Julie K. Brown, the investigative reporter who knows more than almost anyone else about Jeffrey Epstein…The Epstein saga hits on practically every theme of every major conspiracy theory, going back for centuries: It entails allegations of horrific …
WSJ via MSN no paywall + alternate free link: “White House officials are preparing an executive order targeting tech companies with what they see as “woke” artificial-intelligence models, their latest effort to go after diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, people familiar with the matter said. The order would dictate that AI companies getting federal contracts …
The New Republic, no paywall – The Roberts court majority seems bound and determined to undermine the American constitutional order. “To cover the Supreme Court these days is to catalogue its lawlessness. The conservative justices’ latest decision in McMahon v. New York allows the president to effectively demolish the Department of Education—a Cabinet-level department that …
Via Just Security – Classified Information and State Secrets: Why the Senate Must Consider National Security Risks in Judicial Confirmations – “A vote to confirm a judicial nominee is a vote to grant that individual a lifetime security clearance and access to some of the country’s most closely held secrets. This week, the Senate Committee on …
MakeUseOf: “While our phones’ screens are their main draw, phone backs have many tricks of their own. In fact, you have plenty of reasons to look at the back of your phone other than cleaning fingerprints…”
ProPublica: “The Internal Revenue Service is building a computer program that would give deportation officers unprecedented access to confidential tax data. ProPublica has obtained a blueprint of the system, which would create an “on demand” process allowing Immigration and Customs Enforcement to obtain the home addresses of people it’s seeking to deport. Last month, in …
The loss of dark skies is so painful, astronomers coined a term for it – ‘Noctalgia’ is a feature of the modern age. The Light Pollution Map uses the Bortle Scale to help find places to mitigate noctalgia. Building the world’s most detailed, interactive global light‑pollution map. Visualize Bortle classes, SQM values & certified Dark‑Sky …
Follow up to Unlawful Orders: How Libraries Became the Front Line in the Fight for Democracy – See also The New York Times / no paywall – Proposed legislation would pressure publishers to adjust borrowing limits and find other ways to widen access. “It’s hard to imagine a library that doesn’t carry “Fahrenheit 451.” But …