Voices
Never Trust a Reporter Who Bounces in His Chair With Glee
Axios’s gleeful use of Donald Trump’s latest xenophobic policy announcement as a PR tool for its new HBO show is grotesque.
Sam Biddle
Sam Biddle is a technology reporter focusing on issues of surveillance, privacy, and corporate power. He was previously a senior writer at Gawker, and his work has also appeared in GQ, Vice, and the New York Times magazine, among other outlets.
Contacts:
- sam.biddle@theintercept.com
- @sambiddle.99 on Signal
- @sambiddle.com on Bluesky
- @samfbiddle on X
Posts:
Making a Killing
Some Silicon Valley Superstars Ditch Saudi Advisory Board After Khashoggi Disappearance, Some Stay Silent
Some major players in tech are distancing themselves from Saudi's Neom “smart city” project after the reported assassination of Jamal Khashoggi.
Government Report: "An Entire Generation" of American Weapons Is Wide Open to Hackers
Testers were easily and routinely able to take over real weapon systems using simple tools against “mission-critical cyber vulnerabilities.”
The Government Wants Airlines to Delay Your Flight So They Can Scan Your Face
The feds are mad that, in a pilot program, airlines are keeping flights on time by letting passengers skip a facial recognition procedure at boarding.
Facebook Brushed Off the U.N. Five Separate Times Over Calls for Murder of Human Rights Worker
A U.N. report said a post about the “Muslim ... national traitor” was shared over 1,000 times and that comments called for the person to be killed.
Sheryl Sandberg Misled Congress About Facebook’s Conscience
Facebook executive Sheryl Sandberg said the company doesn’t operate in countries where it can't hew to democratic values. That’s just not true.
Election Insecurity
Are We Making Elections Less Secure Just to Save Time?
Technologies like Wi-Fi that help deliver lightning-quick election results to a ravenous public can make voting infrastructure more vulnerable to hackers.
Facebook Suspended a Latin American News Network and Gave Three Different Reasons Why
Facebook offered a jumble of explanations for why Telesur's English-language page was suddenly taken down and then reinstated two days later.
Election Insecurity
A Swing-State Election Vendor Repeatedly Denied Being Hacked by Russians. The New Mueller Indictment Says Otherwise.
VR Systems was “hacked into” by Russian military intelligence, Robert Mueller's investigation has found.
The War on Immigrants
Thomson Reuters Defends Its Work for ICE, Providing “Identification and Location of Aliens”
The company is under pressure from Privacy International for its nearly $30 million in ICE contracts via two subsidiaries.