Data Privacy

We live in an e-commerce utopia. I can call out orders and my demands are satisfied through an automated, seamless transaction. I just have to ask Alexa, or Siri, or one of the other digital assistants developed by Silicon Valley firms, who await the commands and manage the affairs of their human bosses. Read more about Here’s why tech companies abuse our data: because we let them

What exactly was the extent of Russian meddling in the 2016 election campaign? How widespread was its infiltration of social media? And how much influence did its propaganda have on public opinion and voter behavior?

Scholars are only now starting to tackle those questions. But to answer them, academics need data — and getting that data has been a problem. Read more about How Facebook Stymies Social Science

Over the past couple of years, the U.S. government and Microsoft have been fighting a legal battle over whether Microsoft has to provide customers’ email that is stored on company servers located in Ireland. On Thursday, a federal appeals court ruled against the government, saying Microsoft was under no legal obligation to provide the data.

This case has been very closely watched, as it has very important implications for how the U.S. legal system deals with a world where data moves easily across borders. Read more about Microsoft just won a big privacy fight with the government. Here’s what that means.