Every government does stuff because it can, not because it needs to. But this current administration has been far more opportunistic than most, doing constitutional recon in areas of unsettled law right up until a court rules that it can’t. (In some cases, it continues to do these things despite having lost in court.) While […]
If you enjoy badly written bipartisan protectionist tech legislation designed primarily to coddle giant U.S. companies under the xenophobia-tinged breathless pretense of privacy and national security, you are really going to enjoy the next twelve to twenty-four months. While the U.S. drowns in corrupt kakistocracy, the Chinese are making significant market inroads in everything from […]
I want to start this whole thing off with a disclaimer. Nothing in this post should be misconstrued as gloating, as being pleased, or as having a connotation that is anything beyond sadness and the need for change. Nobody is happy to have the obvious confirmed when it comes to a child’s death. There is […]
For the last few months, there has been much talk of AI agents going “rogue”. This is another of those unhelpful anthropomorphisms that are great for clickbait headlines, but which obscure a multitude of important issues. So far, there have been three major incidents of AI agents evading containment in their software “sandboxes” and going […]
Let’s start out with the obvious (and obviously heartbreaking): this is not related to the multiple times ICE officers have murdered people. Those officers still remain at large and the DOJ and DHS have shown absolutely zero interest in following up on those cases. In fact, when any local agency attempts to do so, they’re […]
Here we go again: another case where it’s easy to cheer a court ruling against Elon Musk, and unfortunately easy to miss the much more important underlying point — which the judge clearly did. In July, we wrote about how even as awful as Elon Musk is, and as awful as it was that (with […]
InfoSec4TC Projects Hub is the missing link between cybersecurity theory and real-world practice. Instead of watching more lectures, you’ll step directly into simulated corporate environments and complete actual cybersecurity and GRC projects designed by industry professionals, the same kind of work security analysts and compliance officers handle on the job every day. The Hub includes […]
One of the natural side effects of flooding the zone with hastily hired, poorly trained immigration enforcement officers is an increase in violence and rights violations. Christian Castro may not have been a new ICE hire, but he’d been there long enough to realize the new White House boss had given him and his fellow […]
In addition to the $111 billion Paramount/Warner Bros merger just being foundationally bad for creatives, labor, and consumers, the Ellison family-owned company’s executives just keep demonstrating why they’re not really the kind of folks you want dominating the lion’s share of U.S. media. That’s included calling deal critics “antisemitic,” cozying up to foreign authoritarians, constantly […]
The measles outbreak, that began in America nearly two years ago, has only increased in velocity. We recently talked about the deaths of two children in Pennsylvania who both died while infected with measles. I’m altering my language slightly here from that original post in which I described those children as having died of measles […]
In a handful of known cases, large social media companies have privately pushed back against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) subpoenas when the agency tried to unmask anonymous users who tracked immigration activities or criticized the government. As ICE engages in a pattern of illegal and chilling investigations, any resistance is welcome. But social media companies can do […]
It would be nice to go a day or two (or three-day weekend!) without being apprised of some new awfulness from this administration. Since that’s not going to happen, let’s check in with the latest shitshow! And here it is: the Pentagon has “enlisted” some X.com influencers to thrust and parry on behalf of the […]
I am never asking the monkey’s paw for a federal government that defends fair use again. For decades on Techdirt, I’ve talked about the absolute necessity of strong fair use, and have been disappointed over and over again at how little the federal government has fought for fair use. For decades, the rare times when […]
The 2026 Data Engineering Bundle has 7 online courses designed to help learners build skills that align directly with industry expectations. The focus is on practical tools and languages used by data professionals: Python for programming, Pandas and NumPy for data manipulation, foundational certification prep and specialized work with Databricks, an industry-standard platform for data engineering […]
A whistleblower report delivered to the DHS Office of the Inspector General makes it clear ICE is willing to hire pretty much anyone who applies for the job. Keeping up appearances (and by “appearances,” I mean constantly pushing for 1,500-3,000 arrests per day) is tough when you don’t have the warm bodies to do all […]
We’ve well established how the $111 billion Paramount and Warner Brothers merger is terrible for labor, creatives, consumers, and markets. But the kind of behaviors Paramount leadership have been engaged in to sell the deal also give a pretty clear indication what kind of company we’re dealing with, and why they shouldn’t be allowed to […]
This week, our first place winner on the insightful side is Thad with a comment about calls for RFK Jr.’s resignation coming entirely from Democrats: And that’s why trying to distill partisan politics down to just “team blue” vs. “team red” is reductive at best and false equivalence at worst. This and many other life-or-death […]
I have mostly stayed away from the whole saga surrounding the drip-drip leaks of Grand Theft Auto 6 content prior to the big reveal on Netflix because, frankly, I am quite wary of giving companies the kind of guerilla marketing wins that sometimes look like this sort of thing. That being said, I really don’t […]
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. You might assume that what you tell a doctor stays between you, your physician and perhaps your insurer. But the reality is more complicated. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, the federal privacy law that governs health information and is commonly known as […]
stLouIST