SILENCE MACHINE coming to protests near you? And more technology news.

Image: Cornell

The ghosts in our machines: DHS’ “complete operational awareness”

You are leaving work, walking through the city, tweeting about politics and texting your friend about dinner plans. You turn the corner to skip down the stairs to get the train. You are focused on your phone: twitter, the music in your ears. You slide your metro card through the electronic card reader and step inside. 

MA judge: no right to anonymous speech online

The government can very easily access our private data when it is held by third parties like Twitter, Google, Facebook or Verizon, and unless we act to change the law, we might not have the right to challenge any disclosures in open court.

Clobbering democracy, Chicago-style

While the president is getting bashed by Republican wannabe presidents for “big government” bailouts, his former chief of staff is experimenting with anti-democratic elements of neo-liberal “shock doctrine” in Obama’s home town. 

GUILTY: Thought crimes, future crimes and speech crimes

The United States Government is playing a very dangerous game with the First Amendment, and unfortunately, some members of the media are cheerleading the effort.

NYPD spying program “offends every single principle of justice that we know”

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FBI pulls the plug on GPS tracking devices

How many GPS devices have been secretly installed on cars by the FBI without warrants? A hundred? A thousand? More?

The answer, according to FBI general counsel Andrew Weissmann, is closer to three thousand. That’s 3,000!

Rep Peter King “trusts” NYPD to appropriately spy on Muslims

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The chair of the House Homeland Security Committee, Peter King, supports the NYPD's racist program of spying on Muslim communities in and around New York. Watch.

Who are the real extremists?

The Triangle Center of Terrorism and Homeland Security recently released its third report on Muslim-American Terrorism.

Journalists should fact check. Otherwise they are stenographers for power.

Have you ever heard the maxim, "You can't lie to the FBI, but they can lie to you"? Unlike many things your high school friends told you, this one is actually true. You can go to jail for years if convicted of "making false statements" to any federal government official, but FBI agents are allowed to lie to you, no problem.