Dr Margie Cheesman

The Digital Sovereignty Observatory | King's College London The Digital Sovereignty Observatory examines how emerging technologies reshape social and political boundaries.

Our new research initiative @digsovobs.bsky.social has a page! Give us a follow.

The Digital Sovereignty Observatory examines how emerging technologies reshape social and political boundaries.

@kerenweitzberg.bsky.social @sixfouronea.net @emryss.bsky.social

www.kcl.ac.uk/research/the...

World’s success in LatAm is based on dubious grounds, says digital rights activist | Biometric Update The NGO says World's success is the result of a weak rule of law and sophisticated technological processes that allow its to avoid data protection rules.

📢 At the bleeding edge of #DigitalSovereignty struggles: critics are warning that the rapid uptake of "World" in Latin America—nearly 40M app users and 17M eyeballs verified!—is built on weak legal frameworks and loopholes that sidestep data protection. www.biometricupdate.com/202602/world...

Europe's $24 Trillion Breakup With Visa and Mastercard A 130-million-user payment system backed by 16 major banks just launched to challenge Visa/mastercard

Struggles for sovereign payments infrastructure: Europe is pushing to break its reliance on US-controlled payment giants like Visa & Mastercard, driving new pan-European systems (like Wero) and sparking debate about financial autonomy. europeanbusinessmagazine.com/business/eur...

QuitGPT — OpenAI Execs are Trump's Biggest Donors Join the movement. Delete ChatGPT. Cancel your subscription. It's time to quit.

'ChatGPT is Trump's biggest donor, and ICE uses ChatGPT'. quitgpt.org

The powerful tools in ICE’s arsenal to track suspects — and protesters Biometric trackers, cellphone location databases and drones are among the surveillance technologies agents are using in their immigration enforcement campaign.

Biometric trackers, cellphone location databases and drones are among the surveillance technologies agents are using in their immigration enforcement campaign.

Understanding Digital Rights: An Illustrated Guide - Institute of Development Studies An illustrated guide to understanding digital rights, why we need them and how to secure them. It details organisations working in this area.

An Illustrated Guide to Digital Rights
This Zine version of Understanding Digital Rights
has been produced by top Zambian illustrator, Kiss Abraham.
Free to download from the Institute of Development Studies.
www.ids.ac.uk/publications...

Home Office TikTok account posting deportation footage accused of turning ‘brutality into clickbait’ Video of raids and migrant arrests shared by profile with slogan ‘restoring order and control to our borders’

Hard to think of anything which better epitomises this government

🎧 New PAGE 94 Podcast OUT NOW

This week: On thin ICE

Why does the USA now have masked militias roaming its streets with almost no oversight? Ian, Helen, Adam and Andy explore.

Listen: pod.fo/e/377d64
YouTube: youtu.be/V59br2CBgJ0

Check out the latest @ids.ac.uk Humanitarian Evidence and Discourse summary. It includes our essay on the human costs of innovation alongside other new research @cearadau.bsky.social opendocs.ids.ac.uk/articles/rep...

The year of technoligarchy In 2025, Trump brought tech executives into power to dismantle regulators and write their own rules. But the instabilities they’re creating may be their downfall.

“WAGMI” — we're all gonna make it — was crypto's 2021 rallying cry. But those with wealth and power knew it was a lie, and that “all” just meant them. My latest traces the last five years from hype to technoligarchy — and why they're not all gonna make it either.

British Politics and Policy 2025 top posts | British Politics and Policy at LSE The defining features of British politics in 2025 have been the rise of Reform UK in the polls, and the impact of Donald Trump on the UK's domestic politics.

Our post about UK digital ID made the LSE's list of top politics blogs 2025 blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...

@kerenweitzberg.bsky.social @empo11on.bsky.social

Statelessness and Digital Identity | Caribou How digital ID systems affect stateless people, and why inclusion must go beyond registration to ensure rights and recognition

Why "inclusive" digital ID isn't enough.

@bronwenmanby.bsky.social: "For people whose nationality is unrecognized or in doubt, being added to an identity system may not improve their legal status—and, in some cases, may entrench existing forms of exclusion."

caribou.global/publications...

Humanitarianism - Margie Cheesman et al. - Technosocial Reproduction and Humanitarian Reason A white van rolled through the gates of a refugee camp in mainland Greece, its driver unloading a stack of pre-packaged lunches.

New article w @cearadau.bsky.social
Connecting feminist theory with technology studies, our lens - technosocial reproduction - explains how tech interventions should replenish rather than deplete the overlooked work people already do to sustain life.

www.eflux.com/architecture...

💥 Sovereignty as a service. New article in Media, Culture & Society on how big tech companies are co-opting and redefining digital sovereignty. Co-authored by me and Alexandre Costa Barbosa

journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

Ahead of publication of our special issue on Authoritarianism in the Digital Age, the editorial sets out the approach we have taken to the topic and describes the 48 diverse and rich papers in the volume- most of which are already available to read. journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

📸 In analysis of Henrietta Williams' photographs of the Ring of Steel, Dr George Legg from @kingsinterhums.bsky.social explores the impact of invisible security technology in the City of London – showing how hiding surveillance prevents us from querying its intentions.

🔗 Read more ⤵️
buff.ly/d6KjphO

FYI Londoners: a timely event connecting global perspectives on #digitalID.

I'll share new work w Andreas Hack on 'the imposter economy': how refugees borrow or modify identities and locations to navigate exclusion from digital platforms, while targeted by resettlement, study, and employment scams.

📣 Registration is open for our event Reimagining Digital ID @mediacomgold.bsky.social @goldsmithsuol.bsky.social w/ findings from our www.redid.net project and talks by colleagues working on implications of Digital ID in Global South, migrant & refugee contexts explore.gold/digital-id All welcome! ⬇️

dow schull's addiction by design? few years ago tho

Outsourcing surveillance: The technological side of border externalisation | Heinrich Böll Stiftung - Thessaloniki Office One of the latest iterations of the border externalisation strategy includes the export of surveillance technologies and border control infrastructure. These tools – ranging from biometric databases a...

Last week at @periodismomigra.bsky.social we had a great conversation w @gonzalofanjul.bsky.social @josebautista.bsky.social about development agencies and EU funds in externalization policies.

I wrote about the surveillance component of this EU approach to cooperation
gr.boell.org/en/2025/09/3...

The diaspora lifeline that helps keep Somali families afloat Somalis abroad send hundreds of millions of dollars home each year, more than official aid flows.

Somalis abroad send hundreds of millions of dollars home each year, more than official aid flows.
Read: ⬇️

YouTube video by Women in Identity Talking Legal Identity, Race and Belonging with Dr Eve Hayes de Kalaf

A video I recorded w/Women in Identity underlining the dangers of universal #digitalidentity, the significant impact of these rapidly evolving technologies & the (un)intended consequences they will have in challenging people's right to exist & citizenship. www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBV1...

Read this excellent summary of our article on the proposed UK #digitalidentity system.

Thanks Antonella @svaroschi.bsky.social

#Britcard

The Britcard – progressive or concerning? | British Politics and Policy at LSE The Government is considering Labour Together's proposal to introduce mandatory digital ID cards in an effort to tackle irregular migration. There are problems with that.

In July, Keren Weitzberg, @empo11on.bsky.social and @margchee.bsky.social wrote about the digital ID proposal.

The three experts say that the current proposal presents a false choice between digital exclusion and mass surveillance.

A few key points 🧵
blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...

Public criticism of compulsory ID has a long history in the UK, which predates the advent of Twitter/X (in fact, it even predates the Blair-era controversy over biometric ID cards in the early 2000s). Also, criticism of the new scheme is coming from BOTH the right & left of the political spectrum.

what a time to be alive

Keir Starmer set to unveil digital ID scheme UK prime minister hoping to avoid his Labour predecessor’s failure to push through plan in the 2000s

It appears the UK Labor government is moving forward with plans to introduce digital IDs to address complex migration challenges www.ft.com/content/f2b3...

In July, @margchee.bsky.social, @kerenweitzberg.bsky.social and I wrote about the challenges that lie ahead

blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...

Satellite images show how receiving aid in Gaza became so deadly Hundreds of Palestinians have reportedly been killed by Israeli gunfire and in crushes while trying to collect food

How aid distribution turned lethal - the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation www.economist.com/interactive/...

Swap Around and Find Out: The New Rules of International Digital Economic Warfare - War on the Rocks On Feb. 21, 2025, North Korean state hackers linked to the Lazarus Group pulled off the largest digital theft in history, stealing around $1.5 billion

“Cryptocurrency, once just a niche financial curiosity, is now at the forefront of economic warfare,” argue Adam Zarazinski and Bruno Faviero.

Why sovereignty matters for humanitarian data - Aaron Martin, 2025 Technological interventions in aid are both complex and deeply ambiguous. Nonetheless, many contemporary controversies surrounding humanitarian data reflect und...

New paper out in @bigdatasoc.bsky.social on #humanitarian #data #sovereignty💥

doi.org/10.1177/2053...

My deep gratitude to @kerenweitzberg.bsky.social, @margchee.bsky.social, @emryss.bsky.social, Quito Tsui, Paul Currion, @sophiebt.bsky.social, and @massimomarelli.bsky.social for the inspiration ❤️