Local police departments use Flock cameras to track license plates.
asserted
departments → use → plates
ICE uses Palantir software to track and round up immigrants.
asserted
ICE → use → immigrants
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s war department uses Claude to bomb Iran.
asserted
department → use → Iran
The U.S. government spends billions employing private corporations to obtain mountains of data — and the surveillance space is only getting more privatized in Donald Trump’s second term.
“It really has become a Wild West,” 404 Media co-founder Jason Koebler tells host Akela Lacy on The Intercept Briefing, on the state of the U.S. surveillance apparatus today.
asserted
Koebler → spend → apparatus
While Palantir and Flock have become household names, Koebler says, “anything that can be surveilled is being surveilled, and a lot of this is happening from companies that very few people have heard of, and companies that are willing to push the envelope on what they’re willing to do, like how far they’re willing to go to surveil people.”
asserted
they → become → people
“A lot of the stuff that you used to associate with the NSA or CIA or another state spy agency, those kinds of capabilities you can now just buy,” Intercept senior technology reporter Sam Biddle notes of the ease and accessibility of the tools now available to the government.
asserted
Biddle → use → government
“You don’t need to be a top-secret government agency.
asserted
You → need → ?
“It’s a way to sidestep warrant requirements,” says Koebler.
asserted
Koebler → ’ → requirements
Surveillance contractors “are doing things that if the government were doing directly, they would need to get a warrant in order to do it.”
asserted
they → do → it
This week, for a special recording of the podcast, independent tech outlet 404 Media and The Intercept teamed up in front of a live audience in Los Angeles to discuss how the U.S. government weaponizes private data to surveil and kill abroad and at home, the resulting backlash and potential regulations on the table, what tangible actions the average person can take to “divest from the contemporary surveillance hellscape,” and refocusing AI-ending-humanity doomerism.
asserted
person → team → doomerism
“When you ascribe motives and agency to AI, you’re letting Sam Altman off the hook,” says Biddle.
asserted
Biddle → ascribe → hook
It’s not inevitable.
asserted
It → ’ → ?
This doomsday future is not inevitable,” adds Koebler.
asserted
Koebler → add → ?
“We can’t bury our heads in the sand and say, ‘This is not changing society in some way.’
asserted
This → bury → way
But it is being driven by very rich humans, and they can be regulated.
asserted
they → drive → humans
They can be held to account.”
asserted
They → hold → account
“What’s been really interesting about the Flock backlash, and heartening, is that it is completely apolitical, or it’s nonpartisan.
asserted
it → hearten → backlash
It is completely — from the deepest red to the people in this room right now — the entire political spectrum hates these,” says Biddle.
asserted
Biddle → hat → these
“There’s the real potential for the first time in a while to create a pro-privacy coalition that bridges a lot of the otherwise pretty giant political gaps.”
asserted
that → ’ → gaps
For more, listen to the full conversation of The Intercept Briefing on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you listen.
asserted
you → listen → Podcasts
Welcome to The Intercept Briefing, I’m Akela Lacy, senior politics reporter at The Intercept.
asserted
I → welcome → Intercept
Today we’re coming to you live from Los Angeles for a special episode in collaboration with 404 Media.
asserted
we → come → Media
We’re talking lethal autonomous weapons; AI-assisted strikes in Iran; mining your digital footprint and even your financial activity to track you down; and surveillance cameras coming soon to a neighborhood near you.
asserted
We → talk → you
Just this week, warnings from Anthropic researchers that AI could kill humanity set off alarm bells on Capitol Hill and prompted a bipartisan group of lawmakers to call for immediate action to regulate the AI industry — from Republican Sen. Ted Cruz to Independent populist Bernie Sanders, who is organizing senators for a briefing next week on the “extraordinary dangers” of AI.
uncertain
who → kill → AI
The world we’ve long been told to fear is here.
asserted
we → tell → ?
But how much do we actually know about these tools and how the government is using them — not just against you and your neighbors, but around the world?
To take us down the rabbit hole, I’m joined by my colleague, Intercept reporter Sam Biddle, a senior technology reporter who focuses on issues of surveillance, privacy, and corporate power.
asserted
who → know → surveillance
Also joining us is Jason Koebler, co-founder of 404 Media, where he writes about surveillance and AI.
asserted
he → join → surveillance
We’re very excited.
asserted
We → ’re → ?
To start, can you all just paint us a picture of what the broad surveillance tech apparatus looks like today?
asserted
apparatus → start → what
Many of our listeners are familiar with some of the biggest players, like the data mining government contractor Palantir or Flock, the operator of surveillance hardware marketing itself as a friendly neighborhood public safety tool.
asserted
Many → market → tool
But let’s zoom out a little bit.
asserted
’s → let → ?
Like, how did we go from the days of the National Security Agency and Edward Snowden, to this largely privatized and, in many ways, even more lawless world of mass surveillance?
asserted
we → go → surveillance
Sam, I’ll start with you.
asserted
I → start → you
What’s stayed the same since that NSA era, and what’s new now?
asserted
what → stay → era
The NSA is still here, to say the least.
asserted
NSA → say → least
I don’t think you have this conversation, or certainly not in the form that we’re going to have it tonight, without 9/11.
asserted
we → think → 9/11
I think that the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, the private sector economy that you described, billions and billions of dollars, is all downstream of 9/11.
asserted
you → think → 9/11
I looked it up: In 2006, the DHS budget was, like, $30-something billion.
asserted
budget → look → 2006
The presidential request for next year is $118 billion, and a lot of that is flowing to contractors like Palantir.
asserted
lot → flow → Palantir
To answer your question, Snowden taught us correctly that we have a lot to fear from the government, but there was not as much emphasis on the companies that empower the government.
asserted
that → answer → government
…and 392 more, not listed.
