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The puppy, one of two stolen from a St. Louis County home, is expected to recover.

An investigation is underway after a pedestrian was fatally struck Friday evening on Interstate 270 in north St. Louis County.

Excited delirium is a very unique medical condition. It almost always kills its victims. The victims of this apparent sudden cause of death are almost always in the presence of police officers when they die. And the victims are almost always of a certain… type. A 2021 data analysis found that at least 56% of […]

An argument between two people led to a shooting Friday evening in Wentzville, police say.

It was all smiles Friday afternoon at Tower Grove Park as St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones helped cut the ribbon on the new basketball courts.  

A water main break caused tens of thousands of dollars in damages last summer for some northside families along Carter Avenue, many of whom are still seeking help from St. Louis City Hall.

A St. Louis County grand jury has indicted St. Louis firefighter Arnold Britt on one felony charge of receiving stolen property and one misdemeanor charge of fraudulent use of a credit/debit device.

A jury awarded $1.25 million to St. Louis man who suffered non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma after using Bayer-Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide.

What with the House in chaos, there hasn't been much action on the "Biden crime family" front these days. But today the House Oversight Committee released BOMBSHELL evidence that Joe Biden received $200,000 from his brother James in 2018. This came ON THE SAME DAY that James Biden received $200,000 from a hospital company he ...continue reading "Biden crime family clown show still screening in a tweet near you"

Dozens of Palestinian Americans called on the St. Louis Board of Aldermen to send a resolution to Congress and President Biden to urge a ceasefire in Gaza.

Strong encryption is key to protecting newsgathering. "x-email-encrypted" by Electronic Frontier Foundation is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Saturday is Global Encryption Day, a worldwide effort to protect end-to-end encryption and defeat proposals that try to undermine it, such as bills in the U.S. that are ostensibly aimed at protecting children online, but could end up making the internet massively less safe for everyone by discouraging end-to-end encryption.

End-to-end encryption is critically important to journalists’ ability to protect confidential sources and newsgathering materials. That’s why Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) is so concerned about proposed legislation that would discourage platforms from offering it. Earlier this month, FPF, the ACLU, and Americans for Prosperity organized a panel of experts from the worlds of business, domestic violence prevention, and journalism to talk to congressional staff about why encryption matters to so many different people.

One of those experts was Susan McGregor, associate research scholar at Columbia University’s Data Science Institute and co-chair of its Center for Data, Media & Society. In recognition of Global Encryption Day, we asked McGregor to answer a few questions via email about how and why encryption matters to journalists.

What are some examples of reporting that encryption helped with or made possible?

The truth is that encryption supports all kinds of reporting. While national security reporting like the Panama Papers is something that I've studied in depth and often gets a lot of attention, the reality is that encryption is at least as important for essential accountability reporting at the local and regional levels as well. Whether it’s reporters covering local and state elections, agricultural and labor practices, or smaller newsrooms setting up tiplines, encryption — and the technologies that employ it effectively — are critical to securing journalists' communications with sources and each other.

So then it’s not just reporters on the national security beat using encryption?

No, not at all. In addition to being important for protecting the information that journalists are provided by all types of sources, encryption is key to making sure that information and communications within news organizations are kept safe as well. Unfortunately, there are a growing number of examples of aggressive tactics being used against news organizations doing important local investigations, and encryption is crucial for allowing them to protect their work.

Some argue we should have a “backdoor” that lets law enforcement access end-to-end encrypted messages in emergencies or for criminal investigations that meet a certain threshold.

What is sometimes described as a "backdoor" for law enforcement is really just another word for “key.” In important ways, encryption “locks” information; “keys” are used to “unlock” that information. The problem with having multiple keys is that it’s possible for any one of them to fall into the wrong hands more easily. Though it would be great if we could trust that these extra keys would only be accessible to the “right” people at the “right” time, the reality is that even very valuable keys of this type have been stolen in the past. And of course, if the people you're investigating have access to that key, it’s going to be an even bigger problem.

If encryption is weakened or eliminated, are there other ways for journalists and confidential sources to protect themselves from surveillance?

While there are ways to protect journalist-source communications without encryption, the result would be even less effective reporting at the local and regional levels, because the effort and cost of reporting safely would go up dramatically, and many important stories simply wouldn’t be possible. The truth is that you can’t really use any digital technologies securely without encryption, so losing strong encryption would basically eliminate effective reporting on technology products and companies, for one. But even where one could theoretically replace digital tools with analog alternatives, the scope of what newsrooms could cover safely would still be reduced dramatically.

What alternatives should lawmakers consider for protecting children and others online without weakening or outlawing encryption?

Let's be clear: Encryption is necessary for protecting everyone who has or will have an online life, including — if not especially — children. Without encryption, it would be impossible for anyone to have truly private digital communications of any kind. Given the current rapid advances in AI, essentially any image or video, no matter how innocuous, can be manipulated into something harmful or exploitative — and without encryption, bad actors will have unfettered access to basically any digital image or video in existence. For anyone concerned about protecting children's safety and development, that is a terrifying prospect. Lawmakers truly concerned about protecting children need to focus their efforts on supporting methods for identifying harms to and providing support for children before they are harmed in the first place, not on approaches that wait for evidence of that harm to make it to the internet or anywhere else.

When Illinois lawmakers return to the Capitol next week for their annual fall veto session, they have a full agenda, including a handful of vetoes from Gov. J.B. Pritzker to consider overriding, in addition to deciding whether to revive a private school scholarship program. But additional state spending is unlikely to be on their agenda, according to recent comments from both the governor and House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch. The prospect of a supplemental spending plan had been floated…

The New York Times printed excerpts from a focus group of Trump leaners today—though I have to say that the participants mostly struck me as more than just leaning. Maybe they weren't all MAGAnauts, but they were pretty devoted to Trump. In any case, the whole thing is worth reading for the smh value, but ...continue reading "Trump voters and what they believe"

This time of year, Brookdale Farms gives us the heebie-jeebies. Plagued by evil, the Field of Nightmares admits only the bravest souls. Here, spirits roam the land and haunt the […]

The post Field of Nightmares appeared first on Explore St. Louis.

Two suspects are facing charges after stealing two French bulldogs from a north St. Louis County woman, along with her safe. It wasn't until police recently completed a STING operation that they uncovered the two were connected with a larger criminal enterprise.

On Friday afternoon, Kim Young received a new car, a 2017 Kia Sorento, from an anonymous donor.