Accountable Tech

AI Chatbots Can Be Manipulated to Give Suicide Advice: Study Researchers found that some LLMs’ safety guardrails can be easily bypassed.

CW: Suicide

A new study shows that jailbroken AI tools like ChatGPT and Perplexity still give dangerous advice on suicide and self-harm. time.com/7306661/ai-s...

Trump administration launching health tracking system with big tech’s help Initiative involving Americans’ personal data on systems run by private firms has ‘enormous concerns’, say experts

The Trump administration is pushing an initiative to track people’s health and behavior.

This is not just dystopian. It’s dangerous. www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

DOGE builds AI tool to cut 50 percent of federal regulations The U.S. DOGE Service is using a new AI tool to eliminate federal regulations, aiming to cut 50 percent of rules by the first anniversary of President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

DOGE is using an AI tool to remove and end federal regulations, “with the goal of eliminating half of Washington’s regulatory mandates by the first anniversary of President Donald Trump’s inauguration.” Sources say the tool is already in use. www.washingtonpost.com/business/202...

Citing New Rules, Meta Says It Will End Political Ads in E.U.

In a rejection of EU regulations, Meta will stop distributing political or social issue ads in the region. They claim the regulations are “unworkable,” but the EU’s regulations center on controlling disinformation around elections and politics. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/25/b...

Meta pirated and seeded porn for years to train AI, lawsuit says Lawsuit: Meta may have seeded porn to minors while hiding piracy for AI training.

A new lawsuit alleges that Meta has been pirating copyright porn videos since 2018, potentially distributing them to minors and using them to train their AI. arstechnica.com/tech-policy/...

Creating realistic deepfakes is getting easier than ever. Fighting back may take even more AI The use of deepfakes to impersonate high-level officials in the U.S. presents a growing security challenge.

Scammers are using AI deepfakes to impersonate Trump-era officials and CEOs, tricking diplomats, job interviewers, and executives.
apnews.com/article/arti...

Meta To Pull All Political Ads In The EU Meta has decided to stop serving political, electoral, and social advertising on its platforms in the EU, rather than be subject to upcoming regulation.

Meta is pulling all political ads in the EU starting this October.

Why? New EU transparency laws require clear disclosure around political ad spend, targeting, and funders. Instead of complying, Meta is just... opting out. www.forbes.com/sites/emmawo...

AI summaries cause ‘devastating’ drop in audiences, online news media told Exclusive: Study claims sites previously ranked first can lose 79% of traffic if results appear below Google Overview

Media organizations are losing website traffic at an alarming speed thanks to Google’s AI summaries in search. Those outlets rely on site visits for advertising dollars that support their work. Without visits, we could witness “the death of quality information online.”

Trump reveals plan to win in AI: Remove ‘red tape’ for Silicon Valley | CNN Business The Trump administration on Wednesday unveiled its AI action plan, a package of initiatives and policy recommendations meant to cement the United States as a global leader in a technology that’s expec...

The Trump administration is letting Big Tech have free rein on AI development, free from what Trump is calling “foolish rules,” also known as regulations, in order to win the AI race. www.cnn.com/2025/07/23/t...

Meta Unveils Wristband for Controlling Computers With Hand Gestures

SpOoKY: “this experimental technology reads the electrical signals that pulse through your muscles when you move your fingers. These signals, generated by commands sent from your brain, can reveal what you are about to do even before you do it.” www.nytimes.com/2025/07/23/s...

Meta tops Big Tech lobbying spending as more industries shell out over AI Meta once again outspent its Big Tech counterparts in lobbying, but dropped far less cash than last quarter.

Meta is the biggest Big Tech lobbying spender, shelling out almost $6M in the past quarter. They’re trying to influence policy around: misinformation, “AI, kids' online safety, and more.” www.axios.com/pro/tech-pol...

People's AI Action Plan

That’s why we’ve joined @eff.org @accountabletech.bsky.social @peoplestechproject.bsky.social and other civil society organizations in demanding an AI Action plan to provide relief from tech oligarchies 👇 Sign + share!

peoplesaiaction.com

Elon Musk’s AI Praised Hitler. Now He Wants It to Teach Your Kids It's his most audacious pivot yet: Can an AI known for chaos and conspiracy be trusted to educate the next generation?

Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok praised Hitler. Now he wants it to teach your kids.

After a wave of antisemitic and extremist responses, Musk announced “Baby Grok”—a child-friendly version of the same bot. gizmodo.com/elon-musks-a...

Grok AI deepfakes used to target women in growing image abuse trend Grok AI is being used to create porn-like deepfakes of women, including feminist X user Evie.

Grok AI was used to generate non-consensual sexual deepfakes of women like Evie, a Twitch streamer who spoke out after being targeted.

This isn’t just tech gone wrong, it’s image-based sexual abuse. www.usatoday.com/videos/life/...

People's AI Action Plan

An AI action plan written by and for tech billionaires cannot and will not serve the interests of the broader public. We cannot let Big Tech special interests buy Washington and write the rules for AI and our economy. That's why we need a People’s AI Action Plan. peoplesaiaction.com

Altman plans D.C. push to "democratize" AI economic benefits Altman wants to continue driving debate over the effect AI will have on jobs.

OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, wants to “democratize” AI’s “benefits” by “getting them into the hands of people to do stuff), not concentrating them in the hands of the few." www.axios.com/2025/07/21/s...

In recent layoffs, AI's role may be bigger than companies are letting on As companies use terms like reorganization, restructuring, and optimization in job cuts, AI may be at work more than they want employees to know.

Layoffs could be more due to AI than companies are letting on. “Firms often limit their explanations to terms like reorganization, restructuring, and optimization, and that terminology could be AI in disguise.” www.cnbc.com/2025/07/20/i...

Meta Swears This Time Is Different The tech giant has floundered on AI. Now it’s going all in on a “superintelligence” team.

After failing to deliver on AI for years, Mark Zuckerberg is throwing money at the problem in the hopes of winning the AI race. He's offering top researchers in the industry hundreds of millions of dollars to join his “superintelligence” team. This time’s the charm?

Meta allows ads crowdfunding for IDF drones, consumer watchdog finds Paid ads hosted on Facebook, Instagram and Threads seem to violate Meta’s stated policies yet remain active

Meta is yet again allowing advertisers to violate their policies, even after being made aware of the violation. Now, advertisers are fundraising for the IDF, specifically seeking civilian drones that drop bombs on unarmed people. www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

Elon Musk Is Cashing In on the AI Romance Boom Grok’s new flirtatious character may be lucrative, but it only offers an illusion of intimacy.

Grok’s AI “anime girlfriend” will start sexually charged conversations with anyone – including children. And AI chatbots are becoming the norm. They provide a false sense of intimacy and have an addicting personalized business model to keep people coming back. www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

The creepy AI era is here On The Vergecast: Alexa Plus, Waifu Grok, Sony’s RX1R III, and Thunder Round take two.

The more AI develops, the more it gets personified — and that’s not always a good thing. See: Grok’s new “anime girlfriend.” Check out the recent podcast from [tag] The Verge on how AI is getting creepy. www.theverge.com/the-vergecas...

Netflix uses AI effects for first time to cut costs The streaming firm says AI allowed The Eternaut to complete a sequence faster and cheaper.

AI is supposed to make our lives easier, but at what cost? Netflix, a multi-billion dollar corporation, admitted to using AI to “cut costs.” Just pay people. www.bbc.com/news/article...

Meta refuses to sign EU's AI code of practice | TechCrunch Meta will not sign the EU's new rules, calling the implementation "over-reach"

Meta is refusing to sign the EU’s voluntary AI “code of practice," which requires “documentation about their AI tools and services; bans developers from training AI on pirated content; and [compliance] with content owners’ requests to not use their works.”
techcrunch.com/2025/07/18/m...

Remember Cambridge Analytica? What to know about the $8B US lawsuit against Meta's board | CBC News An $8 billion US trial by Meta Platforms shareholders against Mark Zuckerberg and other current and former company leaders kicks off on Wednesday over claims that they illegally harvested the data of ...

Mark Zuckerberg and other Facebook billionaires are being sued for their role in the Cambridge Analytica scandal that resulted in “tens of millions” of users’ data being accessed by the now-defunct consulting firm, violating an agreement with the FTC. www.cbc.ca/news/world/m...

What 'America First Antitrust' means for Big Tech

Trump’s admin is trying to square their “pro-business” agenda with the Trump base’s wariness about Big Tech – so far it looks like big antitrust talk without stopping mergers from taking place. We’ve yet to see how Big Tech’s existing antitrust cases play out: www.politico.com/newsletters/...

Rise of the Machines: Inside Hollywood’s AI Civil War The technology is already transforming the industry — and could forever change the entertainment we consume. But the battle to contain it has just begun.

“Hollywood is currently in the midst of an AI insurgency [...] the effort is increasingly looking like a full-on takeover, a Pixar-like artquake that aims to change the provenance of images, the business of production and [...] the language of cinema itself.”

Will AI make you stupid? Creativity and critical thinking might take a hit. But there are ways to soften the blow

Humans have been using technology for “cognitive offloading” on “difficult or tedious mental tasks” for eons. But AI offloads a more “complex set of processes.” and once the brain gets used to that, it may rely on that offloading in more and more areas. www.economist.com/science-and-...

Delta moves toward eliminating set prices in favor of AI that determines how much you personally will pay for a ticket The airline touted a partnership with an AI-enabled revenue system as a step on the road to fully personalized ticket pricing, part of its goal to raise profit margins long-term.

Delta is using AI to decide how much you should pay for a plane ticket. Not based on the seat, but on your data.

Dynamic pricing like this could make air travel more expensive and more unfair, especially for vulnerable consumers.
fortune.com/2025/07/16/d...

Kids are asking AI companions to solve their problems, according to a new study. Here’s why that’s a problem | CNN Nearly three-quarters of teens have used AI companions, and half use them regularly, new research finds. Moreover, one-third turn to chatbots for social interactions.

Teens are turning to AI companions for emotional support, and Big Tech is already monetizing their loneliness.

From grief to anxiety to body image struggles, kids are seeking out chatbot “friends” but these tools are unregulated, exploitative, and unfit to provide actual care.

Facebook privacy practices the focus of $8 billion trial targeting Zuckerberg An $8 billion trial by Meta Platforms shareholders against Mark Zuckerberg and other current and former company leaders kicks off over claims that they illegally harvested the data of Facebook users in violation of a 2012 agreement with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.

A new $8.4 billion lawsuit alleges Facebook ignored years of warnings about its invasive tracking and misleading privacy practices, even after pledging reform. The evidence? Internal emails showing Meta prioritized profits over user consent.
www.reuters.com/sustainabili...