Serge Egelman
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v0max.bsky.social
Serge Egelman
@v0max.bsky.social

Scientist. Dir. of Usable Security & Privacy at the International Computer Science Institute (icsi.berkeley.edu). Founder, AppCensus (appcensus.io). All opinions are those of his employer(s), and not his own.

https://www.guanotronic.com/~serge/ .. more

Computer science 55%
Sociology 15%
Downfall Bovino Edition. You're welcome.

Reposted by Serge Egelman

ICE is riddled with sex criminals.

A January 2026 report by the Pacific Antifascist Research Collective identified 30 ICE and CBP agents with documented convictions and arrests, some for serious violent and sexual crimes.

At least 20 committed offenses with underage victims.
Here’s How Many ICE and CBP Agents Allegedly Preyed on Children
Apparently the institutions are riddled with accused sex criminals.
www.yahoo.com

I don’t think it’s a lack of self-preservation, but an overinflated sense of self-worth: they don’t expect the leopards to eat *their* faces.

It’s worth noting that even if you don’t explicitly share this information, it can often be inferred from things like your likes, friends/followers, etc.

This has been shown for decades now by researchers; companies are clearly doing this internally for ad targeting.

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

(There’s a reason why they’re terrorizing cities one at a time.)

Not really: do you have any idea how many polling places there are vs ICE agents? It doesn’t scale, it’s a paper tiger.

(I suppose I should clarify, using their constitutionally-protected rights to call out the government for violating the law.)

Good for the WSJ editorial board for being marginally less fascist.

But it shouldn’t be called “civil disobedience” when it’s citizens calling out the government for violating the law…
Editorial board of Murdoch’s WSJ also urging Trump to back down. www.wsj.com/opinion/time...
Editorial board of Murdoch’s WSJ also urging Trump to back down. www.wsj.com/opinion/time...
And, tonight, the network's flagship news program -- 60 Minutes -- ran a clip show of old celeb interviews to "celebrate the movies" rather than put together an episode focused on what's going on in Minnesota.
The person who publishes the Free Press — where the words “Minneapolis” and “Minnesota” never appear tonight — also runs CBS News.
The latest evidence that broadcasting people’s movements and intimate data in the Real-Time Bidding online advertising system is truly dangerous.

www.wired.com/story/ice-as...
ICE Asks Companies About ‘Ad Tech and Big Data’ Tools It Could Use in Investigations
A new federal filing from ICE demonstrates how commercial tools are increasingly being considered by the government for law enforcement and surveillance.
www.wired.com

I could totally see an entire Veep episode about this.

and, presumably, people skills.
🔵 This week's Tom the Dancing Bug
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A BUSY, BUSY ICE ENFORCEMENT OPERATION
with apologies to Richard Scarry
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Brought to you by the rough and ready Inner Hive, including long-time member Brady Marsh and new member SquirrelSaver7. ( bit.ly/theInnerHive )
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READ IT RIGHT HERE👇

This is a very common dodge in US privacy policies.

“We don’t share your data with anyone except our business partners!”

But who are your “business partners”?

“Anyone we share data with.”
This is a mad thing to say in privacy policy for a home alarm / security camera monitoring app (Alarm.com)

Paraphrasing the highlighted text -
“We will not your data with others … unless ‘necessary’ for our business”

Reposted by Serge Egelman

This is a mad thing to say in privacy policy for a home alarm / security camera monitoring app (Alarm.com)

Paraphrasing the highlighted text -
“We will not your data with others … unless ‘necessary’ for our business”

I’m not sure I would have taken the under on dissidents hauled before military tribunals at the one year mark, yet here we are!
AP: Hegseth intends to send JAGs to Minneapolis

"CNN ... says Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is asking the branches to identify 40 lawyers known as judge advocate general officers or JAGs, and 25 of them will serve as special asst U.S. attorneys in Minneapolis."

Reposted by Serge Egelman

AP: Hegseth intends to send JAGs to Minneapolis

"CNN ... says Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is asking the branches to identify 40 lawyers known as judge advocate general officers or JAGs, and 25 of them will serve as special asst U.S. attorneys in Minneapolis."

I guess it could also be a joke about syphilitic dementia.

I feel like there’s an Idi Amin joke hidden in here…

Someone really needs to create Monopsony, the board game in which everyone plays a competing government contractor!

Up until this moment, I had completely forgotten that this is a real product that exists.

Thanks.

Reposted by Serge Egelman

This BBC drivel was parodied 44 years ago by Alexander Cockburn: harpers.org/archive/1982... It is - literally - beyond parody.

Someone absolutely needs to calculate the correlation between this graph and threats to invade other countries.
I went there to look for this and got sidetracked.

Reposted by Serge Egelman

I went there to look for this and got sidetracked.
30 years ago they were like we have to ban song lyrics for the children but it’s full steam ahead for the here’s how to do drugs until you die machine
“ChatGPT started coaching Sam on how to take drugs, recover from them and plan further binges. It gave him specific doses of illegal substances, and in one chat, it wrote, ‘Hell yes—let’s go full trippy mode’”
www.sfgate.com/tech/article...
A Calif. teen trusted ChatGPT for drug advice. He died from an overdose.
"Who on earth gives that advice?"
www.sfgate.com

There’s a huge misconception about what IRBs in the US actually do: it’s not a complete ethics review! And it only applies in very narrow circumstances.

When life gives you salmon roe, make pappardelle!

So 2026 isn't shaping up to be *all* that bad: ten years ago I assumed I would never get to see Rush live, but now I just got tickets to see them—well, 2/3 of them—in October!

Federal elections aren’t changeable without amending the constitution.