Anna Bacciarelli
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abacci.bsky.social
Anna Bacciarelli
@abacci.bsky.social
230 followers 240 following 48 posts
Human rights nerd trying to make AI OK. Human Rights Watch Senior AI Researcher + REAL ML Executive Director.
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
dell.bsky.social
NEW: Records reviewed by WIRED show DHS’s facial recognition app (Mobile Fortify) isn’t designed to actually "verify" identity—despite DHS claims and its agents relying on its matches to support probable cause in the field.
ICE and CBP’s Face-Recognition App Can’t Actually Verify Who People Are
ICE has used Mobile Fortify to identify immigrants and citizens alike over 100,000 times, by one estimate. It wasn't built to work like that—and only got approved after DHS abandoned its own privacy r...
www.wired.com
February 5, 2026 at 8:29 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
drewharwell.com
A retiree wrote this email to a DHS attorney. Within five hours, DHS demanded Google turn over records for his account.

A Kafkaesque form of domestic surveillance, intimidating Americans for lawful speech.

New from us at the Post: www.washingtonpost.com/investigatio... @johnwoodrowcox.bsky.social
“Unconscionable,” Jon thought as he found an email address online for the lead prosecutor, Joseph Dernbach, who was named in the story. Peering through metal-rimmed glasses, Jon opened Gmail on his computer monitor. “Mr. Dernbach, don’t play Russian roulette with H’s life,” he wrote. “Err on the side of caution. There’s a reason the US government along with many other governments don’t recognise the Taliban. Apply principles of common sense and decency.” That was it. In five minutes, Jon said, he finished the note, signed his first and last name, pressed send and hoped his plea would make a difference. Five hours and one minute later, Jon was watching TV with his wife when an email popped up in his inbox. He noticed it on his phone. “Google,” the message read, “has received legal process from a Law Enforcement authority compelling the release of information related to your Google Account.”
February 3, 2026 at 3:15 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
aclu.org
Watch the full training.
Eyes on ICE: Document and Record
YouTube video by ACLU
www.youtube.com
January 27, 2026 at 10:24 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
aclu.org
Over 200K people joined our training last night on how to document ICE's attacks on our communities.

The Trump administration's cruelty will not break us — we the people are more prepared than ever for this moment.
January 27, 2026 at 10:20 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
bcmerchant.bsky.social
Hundreds of ICE Out protestors at the Amazon building in Santa Monica. Tech workers, high school students, soccer moms and dads. Constant honking in support, even from local cops. Amazon employees entering the building overheard discussing how they did not know the company works with ICE.
January 30, 2026 at 9:07 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
hrw.org
Amid reports that ICE has used facial recognition technology in Minneapolis, a reminder that there is no safe use for this tech on streets or at borders.

Governments should stop using it in public spaces and in immigration and asylum contexts.
How ICE Already Knows Who Minneapolis Protesters Are
www.nytimes.com
January 30, 2026 at 4:41 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
makenakelly.bsky.social
SCOOP: Palantir Defends Work With ICE to Staff Following Killing of Alex Pretti

WIRED obtained Slack conversations + an updated internal Palantir wiki defending the company's work for ICE to outraged workers.

More here:
www.wired.com/story/palant...
Palantir Defends Work With ICE to Staff Following Killing of Alex Pretti
“In my opinion ICE are the bad guys. I am not proud that the company I enjoy so much working for is part of this,” one worker wrote on Slack.
www.wired.com
January 26, 2026 at 10:11 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
carolinehaskins.bsky.social
NEW with @makenakelly.bsky.social, ICE is using generative AI from Palantir to sort through immigration enforcement tips and summarize them. Details here:
www.wired.com/story/ice-is...
ICE Is Using Palantir’s AI Tools to Sort Through Tips
ICE has been using an AI-powered Palantir system to summarize tips sent to its tipline since last spring, according to a newly released Homeland Security document.
www.wired.com
January 28, 2026 at 9:44 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
aljazeera.com
Al Jazeera denounces YouTube's submission to the ban of its broadcast in Israel and calls for adherence to international conventions.
January 29, 2026 at 4:39 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
aljazeera.com
UK police to use AI facial recognition tech linked to Israel’s war on Gaza https://aje.news/ux6dhy
UK police to use AI facial recognition tech linked to Israel’s war on Gaza
January 28, 2026 at 5:00 PM
abacci.bsky.social
New US aviation regulation could be generated by Gemini.

“We don’t need the perfect rule on XYZ. We don’t even need a very good rule on XYZ... We want good enough. We’re flooding the zone.” -- DOT General Counsel

Make it stop.

www.propublica.org/article/trum...
Government by AI? Trump Administration Plans to Write Regulations Using Artificial Intelligence
The Transportation Department, which oversees the safety of airplanes, cars and pipelines, plans to use Google Gemini to draft new regulations. “We don’t need the perfect rule,” said DOT’s top lawyer....
www.propublica.org
January 26, 2026 at 4:53 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
katie0martin.ft.com
"in most cases, these videos appear to have been filmed secretly - using Meta smart glasses."

Argh for the love of god BAN. THE. PERVERT GLASSES.
January 24, 2026 at 8:02 AM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
theonion.com
ICE Deems Being In Privacy Of Own Home Obstruction Of Justice https://theonion.com/ice-deems-being-in-privacy-of-own-home-obstruction-of-justice/
ICE Deems Being In Privacy Of Own Home Obstruction Of Justice
January 22, 2026 at 9:27 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
404media.co
In testimony from a CBP official obtained by 404 Media, the official described how Mobile Fortify returned two different names after scanning a woman's face during an ICE raid. Both were wrong. @evystadium.bsky.social has more.

Scoop by @josephcox.bsky.social: www.404media.co/ices-facial-...
January 20, 2026 at 4:52 PM
abacci.bsky.social
The UK Home Secretary treating Bentham's panopticon as an aspirational concept -- with added AI archive.ph/VcmWb
Shabana Mahmood moodboarding panopticon with no regard for civil liberties, quoted in a Daily Telegraph article
January 20, 2026 at 12:02 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
abeba.bsky.social
are you displeased with today’s AI safety evaluation landscape and curious about what greater conceptual clarity, methodological soundness, and rigour in AI evaluation could look like? if so, consider coming to Dublin to pursue a PhD with me

apply here: aial.ie/hiring/phd-a...

pls repost
About the PhD: Audits and evaluation of AI systems — and the broader context that AI systems operate in — have become central to conceptualising, quantifying, measuring and understanding the operations, failures, limitations, underlying assumptions, and downstream societal implications of AI systems. Existing AI audit and evaluation efforts are fractured, done in a siloed and ad-hoc manner, and with little deliberation and reflection around conceptual rigour and methodological validity. This PhD is for a candidate that is passionate about exploring what a conceptually cogent, methodologically sound, and well-founded AI evaluation and safety research might look like. This requires grappling with questions such as: What does it mean to represent “ground truth” in proxies, synthetic data, or computational simulation? How do we reliably measure abstract and complex phenomena? What are the epistemological or methodological implications of quantification and measurement approaches we choose to employ? Particularly, what underlying presuppositions, values, or perspectives do they entail? How do we ensure the lived experiences of impacted communities play a critical role in the development and justification of measurement metrics and proxies? Through exploration of these questions, the candidate is expected to engage with core concepts in the philosophy of science, history of science, Black feminist epistemologies, and similar schools of thought to develop an in-depth understanding of existing practices with the aim of applying it to advance shared standards and best practice in AI evaluation. The candidate is expected to integrate empirical (for example, through analysis or evaluation of existing benchmarks) or practical (for example, by executing evaluation of AI systems) components into the overall work.
January 15, 2026 at 11:55 AM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
whodat35.bsky.social
This is surreal. 4 Oglala Lakota men kidnapped by ICE in Minneapolis have finally been located. One of them was released but the other 3 are being held at Fort Snelling, a former concentration camp used to imprison Native people incl. the Dakota 38 during Dakota Wars.

ictnews.org/news/north-c...
Four Oglala detainees located, three still in ICE custody - ICT
The four Lakota detainees were reportedly sent to a former concentration camp used during the Dakota Wars
ictnews.org
January 14, 2026 at 10:31 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
rmac.bsky.social
Hannah has been a top, top reporter on all things DOGE and the federal government. Hard to see this other than anything but an attempt to chill journalism and the First Amendment protected right to a free press. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/14/u...
F.B.I. Searches Home of Washington Post Journalist for Classified Material
www.nytimes.com
January 14, 2026 at 3:38 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
hrw.org
An internet shutdown has plunged Iran into a communications blackout as authorities continue to unleash their deadly repression against protesters.

UN member states should press Iran to stop the bloodshed and pursue accountability.
January 9, 2026 at 7:28 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
theonion.com
ICE Opens Interdimensional Detention Center To Indefinitely Imprison Immigrants Across Infinite Number Of Multiverses https://theonion.com/ice-opens-interdimensional-detention-center-to-indefini-1837476700/
ICE Opens Interdimensional Detention Center To Indefinitely Imprison Immigrants Across Infinite Number Of Multiverses
January 8, 2026 at 8:30 PM
abacci.bsky.social
Excessive restrictions on protests by multiple UK governments came in the context of a massive rise in technosolutionist approaches to policing, including biometric surveillance and predictive policing, creating more risk of rights abuses and undermining accountability for harms
hrw.org Human Rights Watch @hrw.org · 29d
The right to protest is under attack in the United Kingdom. 

In a new report, HRW documents that the UK’s Labour government has failed to reverse sweeping anti-protest laws introduced by the previous Conservative government.

Learn more: https://bit.ly/4qerKB0
January 8, 2026 at 7:42 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
thedesk.net
#BREAKING: Instacart says it will halt a practice that used AI to adjust the cost of groceries for different shoppers after a study found some customers were paying as much as 23% more for the same items.
Ending Item Price Tests on Instacart | Instacart
Over the past couple weeks, there’s been a lot written about Instacart and how pricing works on our platform . Some of that coverage raised fair questions. Much of it included misconceptions and misin...
www.instacart.com
December 22, 2025 at 6:28 PM
abacci.bsky.social
The UK government’s plans to use AI to guess the age of child refugees is misguided and cruel, and is set to make a broken system even worse www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home...
‘I was left homeless after the Home Office claimed I wasn’t a child’
The Home Office has advertised a £1.3m contract for an algorithm that can ‘accurately predict someone’s age’. One former asylum seeker tells Holly Bancroft why he thinks this could go very wrong
www.independent.co.uk
December 22, 2025 at 6:09 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
hrw.org
US President Donald Trump recently signed an executive order that proposes to challenge and dismantle a range of “cumbersome” AI laws.

This would promote a future in which many components of society are reliant on AI but with little accountability.
Trump Administration Takes Aim at AI Accountability Laws
Last week, President Trump signed an executive order that proposes to challenge and dismantle a range of “cumbersome” artificial intelligence (AI) laws at state and city level in the US and replace th...
www.hrw.org
December 16, 2025 at 3:04 PM
Reposted by Anna Bacciarelli
tuc.org.uk
➡️ Banning exploitative zero hours contracts
➡️ Sick pay for all from day one
➡️ Expanding paternity, parental & bereavement leave
➡️ Strengthening protections for pregnant women, whistle-blowers and victims of sexual harassment
➡️ Making flexible working the default
➡️ Repealing Tory anti-union laws
December 16, 2025 at 4:40 PM