Just so you know: it’s not normal for your country’s voice communications networks to be completely hijacked by scammers and marketers, rendering it almost unusable. That’s litera…| Techdirt
10 posts published by Leigh Beadon, Mike Masnick, Dark Helmet, Daily Deal, Tim Cushing, and Karl Bode during October 2025| Techdirt
Five Years Ago This week in 2020, a court slowed Trump’s roll on the TikTok ban because the DOJ couldn’t show any actual national security threat. Meanwhile, the attacks on Section 230 were coming in waves, with a stupid new bill from Joe Manchin and John Cornyn quickly followed by two more anti-Section 230 bills, […]| Techdirt
This story was originally published by ProPublica. Republished under a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 license. After a fight with a Black student in a St. Louis suburb left a white student badly injured in March 2024, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey blamed their school district for unsafe conditions, even though the incident occurred after classes and more than a half-mile from […]| Techdirt
Around 10 PM on Monday, September 30th, 2025, federal agents surrounded an apartment building in Chicago’s South Shore neighborhood. ICE, Border Patrol, FBI, ATF—a multi-agency operation targeting suspected members of the Tren de Aragua gang. What happened next should be the biggest story in America. Pertissue Fisher came out to the hallway of her apartment […]| Techdirt
The Hatch Act of 1939 is a beautiful piece of legislation. It disallows all kinds of things, like bribing voters with jobs to vote a certain way, as well as limiting any campaign activity by federal workers. Another thing it does is to prohibit partisan political activity in the course of a staff member’s federal […]| Techdirt
For years now, the MAGA crowd has been absolutely convinced that the Biden administration engaged in the most egregious censorship campaign in American history. They’ve waved around the Murthy v. Missouri case as proof that Biden officials illegally pressured tech companies to remove content (even as the Supreme Court concluded there wasn’t even enough evidence […]| Techdirt
Learn how to harness the power of Excel with the Ultimate Microsoft Excel Training Bundle. The 6 course cover power queries, macros, pivot tables, data visualization, advanced formulas, and more. The bundle is on sale for $30. Note: The Techdirt Deals Store is powered and curated by StackCommerce. A portion of all sales from Techdirt […]| Techdirt
ICE just isn’t getting the job done. Despite the masked men swarming everywhere to arrest every Mexican-looking person in sight, the agency still can’t meet the 3,000 arrests per day quota that White House advisor Stephen Miller has stated is merely the baseline for his expectations. The main reason for this is that we’re running […]| Techdirt
This is, as they say, why we can’t have nice things. This week Senator Ron Wyden — one of the few U.S. Senators who takes public and consumer privacy seriously — attempted to pass two bills that would have expanded privacy laws that currently only apply to government employees. S.2850, or Protecting Americans from Doxing […]| Techdirt
The United States will celebrate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, the country’s founding document, in 2026. Twenty years later, America will celebrate the 250th anniversary of President George Washington’s Farewell Address, which was published on Sept. 19, 1796. The two documents are the bookends of the American Revolution. That revolution began with the inspirational language […]| Techdirt
I’ll start with this: I am certainly not fully politically aligned with Senator Bill Cassidy, but I have typically found him to be genuine and intelligent. Points of disagreement aside, he do…| Techdirt
10 posts published by Dark Helmet, Mike Masnick, Leigh Beadon, Tim Cushing, Daily Deal, and Karl Bode during September 2025| Techdirt
Earlier today we wrote about Trump’s extraordinary admission that he was basing military deployment decisions on old Fox News footage and lies from his advisors. But there’s an even mor…| Techdirt
After months of what can only be described as government kidnapping, Mahmoud Khalil is finally out of detention and released on bail. The Columbia grad student and green card holder was detained by…| Techdirt
When a federal judge ruled last week that Marco Rubio can’t just declare that the US can detain green card holder Mahmoud Khalil based on the Secretary of State’s “vibes checkR…| Techdirt
Earlier this month we noted how Disney and ESPN had sued Sling TV for the cardinal sin of actually trying to innovate. Sling TV’s offense: releasing new, more convenient day, weekend, or week…| Techdirt
There are multiple ways into this story, but almost all of the reporting on what’s happened claims that Disney pulled talk show host Jimmy Kimmel’s show “indefinitely” over comments that Kimmel mad…| Techdirt
It’s probably too much to ask, but I hope California law enforcement agencies will remember who to direct their hate at if this bill becomes law. It’s not the “liberals” run…| Techdirt
Among the attempts to create hagiographic eulogies of Charlie Kirk, I’ve seen more than a few people suggest that Kirk should be respected for being willing to talk to “those who disagree with him”…| Techdirt
We’ve all become entirely too familiar with ACIP, the CDC panel that discusses and recommends vaccination schedules across a wide swath of vaccines. The method by which ACIP became part of th…| Techdirt
When the U.S. government signs contracts with private technology companies, the fine print rarely reaches the public. Palantir Technologies, however, has attracted more and more attention over…| Techdirt
10 posts published by Tim Cushing, Dark Helmet, Mike Masnick, Daily Deal, Cathy Gellis, Karl Bode, and Leigh Beadon during March 2025| Techdirt
In the conversation about keeping kids safe online, the actual experts with the most to offer are all too often treated as outsiders and interlopers. One such expert is Candice Odgers, Professor of…| Techdirt
Social media isn’t the first phenomenon to spark a moral panic about its impact on people’s (and especially young people’s) mental health, and it surely won’t be the last — …| Techdirt
Data portability is an important front in the war for an open internet. A few years ago, it seemed like some major movement was coming, with the joint announcement of the Data Transfer Project from…| Techdirt
Read all of the posts by Jennifer Smith Richards on Techdirt| Techdirt
Posts about tickets written by Mike Masnick, Karl Bode, Techdirt, and anne.hobson.christopher.koopma| Techdirt
10 posts published by Dark Helmet, Karl Bode, Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, Daily Deal, and Leigh Beadon during June 2025| Techdirt
10 posts published by Leigh Beadon, Dark Helmet, Mike Masnick, Cathy Gellis, Tim Cushing, Daily Deal, and Karl Bode during May 2025| Techdirt
Posts about library written by Tim Cushing, Mike Masnick, and Techdirt| Techdirt
I’m not a religious man, but Jesus Fucking Christ. Yet another insane decision that allows the government to ignore constitutional rights has been handed down by the Fifth Circuit Court of Ap…| Techdirt
10 posts published by Dark Helmet, Karl Bode, Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Gretchen Heckmann during July 2024| Techdirt
The self-proclaimed free speech warriors of the Republican party have spent much of the past half-decade trying to find some way to force social media platforms to carry their often-objectionable s…| Techdirt
I’m sorry, but those of you looking forward to riding the Friend Feed Flume at Zuckland or the Search Engine Shuffle at GooglePark are probably out of luck. Florida’s new social media l…| Techdirt
10 posts published by Leigh Beadon, Tim Cushing, Mike Masnick, Gretchen Heckmann, and Karl Bode during June 2024| Techdirt
Congress has absolutely zero constitutional authority to investigate a private website for its editorial decisions. Zero. None. This is First Amendment 101. Yet House Oversight Committee Chairman J…| Techdirt
Western allies are abandoning American leadership while we stand by, morally bankrupt and intellectually spent, watching children starve in Gaza with weapons we provided to a corrupt authoritarian …| Techdirt
Two headlines walked into a UK courtroom: the BBC says “Wikipedia loses challenge,” while the Guardian says “Wikipedia can challenge if the strictest rules apply.” Annoyingly, both are true—and tha…| Techdirt
It’s funny just how often the actions of so-called “strong men” actually show just how scared and fragile they are. And if you want a more specific example of what I’m talki…| Techdirt
There are a few ways to think about Elon Musk’s announcement this week that he’s stepping back from DOGE. The first is that he’s leaving a job he officially doesn’t have. Th…| Techdirt
Remember when TikTok was supposedly an urgent national security threat that required emergency legislation? Funny how that “emergency” keeps getting 75-day extensions. Trump is reported…| Techdirt
Even though the Supreme Court somehow didn’t agree, the ban on TikTok remains unconstitutional garbage for all the reasons we’ve discussed: its impact on the platform itself, the impact…| Techdirt
This post was written on Sunday. By the time you read it there may have been 12,492 further unconstitutional TikTok-related hijinks since then, but because this particular kind of unconstitutional …| Techdirt
As the we wrote in our amicus brief (which it appears the justices did not read – guess they didn’t have time…), if the TikTok ban is blessed, it provides a roadmap for how to avoid the Constitutio…| Techdirt
It seems unfathomable that we’re even here. The First Amendment is one of our clearer constitutional provisions. “Make no law,” it says, “abridging the freedom of speech.” And yet, with the “Protec…| Techdirt
This story was originally published by ProPublica, along with The Texas Tribune, Alianza Rebelde Investiga, and Cazadores de Fake News. Republished under ProPublica’s CC BY-NC-N…| Techdirt
Posts about trade deals written by Mike Masnick and Techdirt| Techdirt
Posts about corruption written by Mike Masnick, Karl Bode, and Tim Cushing| Techdirt
Posts about congress written by Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Karl Bode| Techdirt
As the Jeffrey Epstein scandal continues apace, and MAGA grapples with the gaslit reality they live in, the Trump Administration continues to negotiate so-called trade deals, which are negotiated a…| Techdirt
Posts about supreme court written by Cathy Gellis, Mike Masnick, Dark Helmet, and Karl Bode| Techdirt
Posts about constitution written by Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Techdirt| Techdirt
Posts about abrego garcia written by Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Karl Bode| Techdirt
10 posts published by Mike Masnick, Karl Bode, Tim Cushing, Daily Deal, and Leigh Beadon during August 2025| Techdirt
Section 706 of the Telecom Act requires the FCC to determine whether broadband is being deployed “on a reasonable and timely basis” to everyone. If the answer is no, the law s…| Techdirt
We just recently wrote about how circuit court judge Richard Posner had admitted to not reading the boilerplate legalese on his mortgage agreement, and wondered why such things were then considered…| Techdirt
This too will be swept away by this administration’s steady stream of injustices, but it’s still worth highlighting before it’s buried by even worse news later. The mass deportati…| Techdirt
President Trump wanted a war on Latin Americans and found an obliging partner in El Salvador, currently headed by President Nayib Bukele. Bukele has managed to bring down El Salvador’s homici…| Techdirt
10 posts published by Dark Helmet, Leigh Beadon, Karl Bode, Mike Masnick, Daily Deal, and Tim Cushing during April 2025| Techdirt
Earlier this month we noted how California was attempting to pass a new law ensuring that broadband would be affordable to poor people. The original law proposed that the biggest ISPs would need to…| Techdirt
This week, our first place winner on the insightful side is Stephen T. Stone with a comment about our call for the government to accept accountability for the power it wields: Bold of you to assume…| Techdirt
Five Years Ago This week in 2020, the DHS was going full gestapo in response to protests in Portland, then quickly expanding the tactics to other cities, starting with Chicago, and was also engagin…| Techdirt
The Trump administration is continuing its dangerous push to surveil and suppress foreign students’ social media activity. The State Department recently announced an u…| Techdirt
Is Including Hidden AI Prompts In Academic Papers Gaming The Peer Review System — Or Keeping It Honest?| Techdirt
10 posts published by Dark Helmet, Mike Masnick, Glyn Moody, Daily Deal, Tim Cushing, and Karl Bode during January 2025| Techdirt
10 posts published by Mike Masnick, Dark Helmet, nirit.weiss-blatt, Michael McGrady Jr, Daily Deal, Karl Bode, Tim Cushing, and Leigh Beadon during December 2024| Techdirt
10 posts published by Dark Helmet, Tim Cushing, Leigh Beadon, Mike Masnick, Gretchen Heckmann, and Karl Bode during April 2024| Techdirt
The Supreme Court’s shadow docket has become a lawless mess. The justices are issuing extremely consequential rulings with either no explanation at all, or with barely a paragraph of reasonin…| Techdirt
10 posts published by Leigh Beadon, Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, Karl Bode, and Gretchen Heckmann during April 2023| Techdirt
10 posts published by Leigh Beadon, Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Karl Bode during December 2023| Techdirt
There was a bit of news in the world of decentralized social media over the past few weeks. It kicked off with the announcement that Jack Dorsey had left the board of Bluesky. This was followed by …| Techdirt
Over the last year or so I’ve seen a disturbing tendency in tech/startup/VC worlds to buy into the neoreactionary view that for startups to be successful they need to get on board the Trump t…| Techdirt
In his latest “drain the swamp” move that will actually flood the entire ecosystem, Trump demanded the Democratic members of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) resi…| Techdirt
For months, the DOJ has insisted to US courts that it has no jurisdiction over the people it rendered to Salvadoran detention facilities. But when the UN came asking, El Salvador told a very differ…| Techdirt
The Supreme Court this morning took a chainsaw to the First Amendment on the internet, and the impact is going to be felt for decades going forward. In the FSC v. Paxton case, the Court upheld the …| Techdirt
Posts about marco rubio written by Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Cathy Gellis| Techdirt
Posts about kristi noem written by Tim Cushing and Dark Helmet| Techdirt
Posts about kidnapping written by Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Techdirt| Techdirt
Posts about ice written by Tim Cushing, Dark Helmet, and Mike Masnick| Techdirt
Posts about dhs written by Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Dark Helmet| Techdirt
Posts about campus speech written by Tim Cushing and Mike Masnick| Techdirt
Posts about school resource officers written by Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Techdirt| Techdirt
Posts about police in schools written by Mike Masnick, Tim Cushing, and Techdirt| Techdirt