Show Notes
This week we're back to discussing stories that have been in the news over the past few months - in particular the stories that have stayed with us and kept us thinking about them.
Links - Expansion of ICE biometrics - Dean Cain joins ICE - ICE access to medicaid data - Industry Day at the US Customs and Border Protection
- Inquiry by Microsoft - Investor concerns about Microsoft use by Israeli government - Israeli government use of Google services - Data sovereignty and Data Localisation across Africa and Asia - Meta violates California's wiretap law - PI's original app data investigation - PI's most recent look at period apps - Amazon Alexa ads? - Grok advertisers - Pew researchers study Google AI summaries - 404 media's experience with Google AI - Cloudflare experimenting with pay per crawl feature for AI companies - You can donate to PI! - Pilot programme - drones in Florida schools - Axon's ethics board resignations over taser drones - UK facial recogntion database searches - ICO complaint
More from Technology Pill
From Spiderman, to Toy Story, to One Night Only, this week we’re talking about some of the summers biggest and weirdest movies, as we think about the use of technology and surveillance in film. Links - Silicon valley has a science fiction problem: https://aeon.co/essays/silicon-valley-has-a-science-fiction-problem - One night only Guardian review: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2026/aug/05/one-night-only-movie-review NY Times review: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/05/movies/one-night-only-review.html
This week we're talking about how the militarisation of tech is shaping civic spaces and what 'dual use' technology actually means with Sophie from Corporate Watch.
This week we're talking to Marianne from SMEX about their new report looking at the differing dynamics of producing, testing, and deployment of militarised technology across the Southwest Asia and Northern African region (SWANA).
This week we're discussing borders, biometrics and more, as we take a look at what kind of surveillance you might experience if you're traveling to the World Cup, or to the EU schengen area. Acronyms - ETIAS: European Travel Information and Authorisation System (new for visa exempt; no biometrics - run by a central unit operated by frontex; this is where manual checks carried out if automated checks flag problems) - VIS: Visa information System (obvs for visas; age lowered to 6? - will soon check other systems) - EES: Entry/Exit system (biometrics on entry; records all border crossings) - CIR: Common Identity Repository (only non-eu citizens; weak anti-discrimination; identity info from visa and ta - data from other databases lives here and is used for purposes beyond travel e.g. police checks in country) - Eurodac: (all asylum seekers, and trying to add undocumented migrants) - ECRIS-TCN: European Criminal Records Information System for Third-Country Nationals (data on non-EU citizens convicted in one or more EU member state) - SIS: schengen information system (an EU database for police, judicial and border control/cooperation, to see whether they are wanted by the police or subject to an entry ban; checked on crossing external schengen border inc eu citizens) - MID: Multiple-Identity Detector - SLTED: Interpol’s Stolen and Lost Travel Documents database (checked on crossing external schengen border inc eu citizens)
This week we're joined by Bill Goodwin, investigations editor at Computer Weekly and award-winning journalist, to discuss Europol's secret shadow IT system — and what it tells us about how law enforcement agencies evade oversight. Links Computer Weekly investigation: https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642525/They-protect-the-law-while-breaking-it-Inside-Europols-shadow-IT-system We Are Solomon: https://wearesolomon.com/en/mag/focus-area/accountability/they-protect-the-law-while-breaking-it-inside-europols-shadow-it-system/ Privacy International's 2019 FOI on Europol: https://privacyinternational.org/report/3225/challenging-drivers-surveillance-eu-access-documents-requests Spanish police and cryptophone intercepts: https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366643318/Spanish-police-systematically-hid-cryptophone-intercepts-from-courts-claims-ex-chief Bill's case Goodwin v United Kingdom: https://globalfreedomofexpression.columbia.edu/cases/goodwin-v-united-kingdom/ The Independent — Reporter's rights violated: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/reporter-s-rights-violated-1438583.html Horizon Parliamentary committee on Horizon redress: https://committees.parliament.uk/committee/365/business-and-trade-committee/news/212661/post-office-horizon-it-scandal-serious-structural-failings-persist-in-redress/ Bill at TCIJ on breaking the Horizon story: https://tcij.org/summer-conference-event/breaking-horizon-post-office-scandal/