Sam Biddle

The acrimonious breakup between Anthropic and the Department of Defense played out largely in public. But despite the high-profile salvos between the artificial intelligence giant and the Pentagon, ostensibly over the ethics of 21st-century warfare and corporate power, their actual falling out hinged on a government contract that has remained hidden away. Through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit conducted with the help of Legal Advocates for Safe Science and Technology, The Intercept obtained more than 400 pages of documents related to the U.S.

Telecommunications giant Verizon is ending several internal programs that foster—or simply mention—a diverse workforce, following a federal probe and threats from Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr. After President Trump issued an executive order to rid the federal government of “diversity, equity, and inclusion” initiatives, the FCC launched a formal investigation into Ver

Among the mega-corporations that surveil you, your cellphone carrier has always been one of the keenest monitors, in constant contact with the one small device you keep on you at almost every moment.

Donald Trump has inherited the most powerful machine for spying ever devised. How this petty, vengeful man might wield and expand the sprawling American spy apparatus, already vulnerable to abuse, is disturbing enough on its own. But the outlook is even worse considering Trump’s vast preference for private sector expertise and new strategic friendship with Silicon Valley billionaire investor Peter Thiel, whose controversial (and opaque) company Palantir has long sought to sell governments an unmatched power to sift and exploit information of any kind. Thiel represents a perfect nexus of government clout with the kind of corporate swagger Trump loves. The Intercept can now reveal that Palantir has worked for years to boost the global dragnet of the NSA and its international partners, and was in fact co-created with American spies.

Out of nine US technology firms contacted by The Intercept earlier in Nov, only one — Twitter — would rule out participating in the creation of a national Muslim registry, something President-elect Donald Trump has floated as a possibility.

On Dec 12, 22 advocacy groups sent a letter to the other eight companies, urging them to take a stand. The letter is signed jointly by a coalition including major progressive and human rights organizations: CREDO, Muslim Advocates, Color of Change, Courage Campaign, Democracy for America, #AllOfUs, Amnesty International USA, Asian Law Caucus, Bend the Arc Jewish Action, Center for Constitutional Rights, Center for Media Justice, Daily Kos, Demand Progress, Desis Rising Up and Moving, Faithful America, Fight for the Future, Free Press, Mijente, MPower Change, Presente, Sum of Us, Ultraviolet. Below is the version of the letter sent to Google. Copies are also being sent to Microsoft, IBM, Facebook, Booz Allen Hamilton, SRA International, CGI, and Apple.