Governance/Regulation/Legislation
Congress Has One Chance to Require a Warrant. It’s About to Miss It
(Claudia Ruiz – Tech Policy Press) The Fourth Amendment warrant requirement was written to keep the government out of your private life: no warrant, no entry. But our government has found two ways around it: buying your personal information from private companies and weaponizing what you already handed over to it in good faith. Here’s the trick: while the US government cannot seize your location history without a court order, it can buy it on the open market from a data broker. This widespread and increasingly concerning practice side-steps rules that should apply. Few people know that even though the government cannot compel your phone company to hand over years of your movements without legal process, it can purchase that same information from a company that extracted it from an app you downloaded to track your steps. The government also cannot demand your financial records without first obtaining authorization from a judge, but it can just buy a profile that combines your utility bills, car registration, credit information, and even address history. These kinds of transactions are now commonplace, including without a warrant, a court order, or even a subpoena. – https://www.techpolicy.press/congress-has-one-chance-to-require-a-warrant-its-about-to-miss-it/
Capitals cool on Brussels age-check app
(Eliza Gkritsi – Politico) National capitals are skeptical and even downright dismissive of a new application created by the European Commission to check the age of internet users, government ministers and officials told POLITICO. The EU executive on Wednesday will recommend that countries use an app it designed to protect kids from online harms, as governments roll out age checks for illegal content such as pornography, alcohol — and, likely soon, social media. But government officials from eight member countries told POLITICO they are unsure, reluctant and even unwilling to adopt the EU app. Many said they preferred their own national solutions instead. – https://www.politico.eu/article/national-capitals-cool-brussels-age-check-app-social-media-children/
Tennessee becomes second state to ban cryptocurrency ATMs over scam concerns
(James Reddick – The Record) Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee signed a bill late last week to ban cryptocurrency ATMs outright over concerns that the kiosks are being used by scammers to steal money from victims. The ban, which will go into effect on July 1, makes Tennessee the second state to introduce such restrictions. Indiana outlawed the technology in March, and a similar measure in Minnesota recently passed the Senate and is awaiting a House vote. Touted by the industry as an alternative to online exchanges, crypto ATMs allow customers to purchase digital currency with cash and now proliferate nationwide in gas stations and grocery stores. But the companies behind them face increasing regulatory scrutiny amid accusations that they serve as the payment portal of choice for scammers. – https://therecord.media/tennessee-bans-cryptocurrency-atms-over-scams
AI’s English Problem—and Why We Should Care
(Sushant Kumar, Ananya Mukherjee – Tech Policy Press) Bhashini’s Delhi office was abuzz in the lead-up to February’s India AI Impact Summit. Building multilingual AI systems from the ground up is no easy task. The process of creating multilingual language datasets for 22+ Indic languages is often referred to by Bhasini CEO Amitabh Nag, as “stitching together by brute force.” The phrase captures the scale of the task: assembling vast volumes of speech, text, and translation data across dozens of languages and dialects, to create a pipeline for indigenous model development. Launched in July 2022 under the aegis of the Digital India Corporation in the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Bhashini’s core mission is to break language barriers across India. Since then, it has rapidly developed over 350+ open source AI models, 4,500+ language training datasets, and launched a co-creation platform bringing together governments, startups, and academia to ideate and build multilingual AI systems. Its models covering voice-first solutions and neural machine translation capabilities are already integrated across multiple government services. Initiatives like Bhashini are a response to a deeper structural challenge in the development of AI: the dominance of English as the primary language of training data. – https://www.techpolicy.press/ais-english-problem-and-why-we-should-care/
Palantir’s ‘Manifesto’ and the Digital Sovereignty of Other Nations
(James Görgen – Tech Policy Press) Imagine if a Brazilian data analysis and artificial intelligence company—founded with seed money from the Brazilian intelligence agency, with the Ministry of Defense as its principal client, and with contracts with security agencies in other countries—published a singular 22-point manifesto on a social media network. It declares that Brazil’s technological elite has “an affirmative obligation to participate in the defense of the nation,” that ethical debates about military technology are “theatrical” and a waste of time, that Brazil’s power makes possible “an extraordinarily long peace,” that the age of soft power is over, and that cultures which have not kept pace with Brazilian development “remain dysfunctional and regressive.”. Imagine, further, that this company held active contracts with public health and education agencies in the United States—contracts awarded without competitive tender through a triangulation with a local state-owned enterprise. What might Washington’s response be? In the current diplomatic climate, it would probably be immediate and forceful. The ambassador would be summoned, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States activated, and congressional investigations launched. No government genuinely committed to national sovereignty would tolerate a foreign company, with ties to its intelligence community, operating within sensitive public systems while declaring explicit allegiance to another nation. This scenario is almost precisely what the American company Palantir has just done. Last weekend, Palantir’s official account on X published a 22-point text presented as a summary of The Technological Republic, a book written by the company’s CEO, Alex Karp and its head of corporate affairs, Nicholas Zamiska. The opening—“Because we get asked a lot”—feigned nonchalance. But the content is an explicit geopolitical program from a company that has merged with the machinery of the largest military-industrial complex on earth. – https://www.techpolicy.press/palantirs-manifesto-and-the-digital-sovereignty-of-other-nations/
Disinformation/Interference
Disinformation campaign targeted Tibetan parliament-in-exile elections
(Daryna Antoniuk – The Record) A China-linked online influence campaign attempted to undermine elections for the Tibetan parliament-in-exile over the weekend but appeared to have little impact, researchers said. The operation, identified by the Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab), was part of Spamouflage, a long-running influence network linked to Beijing. The effort relied on dozens of inauthentic social media accounts pushing criticism of the Tibetan government-in-exile and its leadership. Despite deploying increasingly sophisticated tactics, including AI-generated images, the campaign largely failed to gain traction, researchers said. – https://therecord.media/disinformation-campaign-targeted-tibetan-elections
Security and Surveillance
AI danger is no longer a myth – it’s called Mythos
(Tom Barber – The Interpreter) On a warm Minsk afternoon in June 2010, a Belarusian computer specialist uncovered the world’s first publicly known cyber weapon. Stuxnet, as it came to be known, was a worm that caused centrifuges inside Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment facility to spin out of control by exploiting four zero-days – software vulnerabilities yet to be discovered or patched by developers. The cyber-attack was the culmination of a years-long, multi-billion dollar effort by the United States and Israel. Fast forward to today, however, and the ability to identify and exploit zero-day vulnerabilities is no longer the preserve of highly specialised experts or hackers. Earlier this month, AI giant Anthropic revealed that its latest model, Mythos Preview, can do just that – often chaining multiple exploits together – completely autonomously. It found and exploited thousands of vulnerabilities across every operating system, some decades old and missed by literally millions of tests. – https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/ai-danger-no-longer-myth-it-s-called-mythos
Hackers impersonate Microsoft Teams help desk to breach corporate networks
(Daryna Antoniuk – The Record) Hackers are impersonating Microsoft Teams help desk workers to trick victims into installing data-stealing malware, according to a new report from Mandiant. The campaign, attributed to a newly tracked threat cluster known as UNC6692, combines email flooding, phishing messages and malicious browser extensions to gain access to corporate systems, researchers at the Google-owned cybersecurity company said. The operation begins with a large wave of emails designed to overwhelm a targeted inbox, after which the attacker reaches out via Microsoft Teams using an account outside the victim’s organization, posing as an IT support worker offering help with the email disruption. – https://therecord.media/microsoft-teams-hackers-mandiant
Ukrainian police detain hackers suspected of stealing thousands of Roblox accounts for resale
(Dayna Antoniuk – The Record) Ukrainian law enforcement has detained a group of local hackers suspected of stealing more than 610,000 user accounts from the gaming platform Roblox and reselling them for cryptocurrency on Russian websites, authorities said. Police said on Monday the victims included both Ukrainian and foreign players whose accounts contained valuable digital items, rare equipment and in-game currency purchased with real money. Some accounts also held remaining balances of Roblox’s virtual currency, making them particularly attractive to cybercriminals. The suspects face up to 15 years in prison if convicted and have been placed in pretrial detention while the investigation continues. – https://therecord.media/ukraine-police-detain-hackers-suspected-of-stealing-roblox-accounts
Defense/Intelligence/Warfare
Pentagon adds Google’s latest model to GenAI.mil as usage soars
(Frank Konkel – Defense One) Users of the Pentagon’s enterprise-wide generative-AI platform now have access to Google Cloud’s latest and most advanced commercial AI model, Gemini 3.1 Pro, after several weeks of using the software in preview mode. The software is available to defense users through the GenAI.mil platform and will also be available for all Gemini for Government users across the federal government. “Gemini 3.1 Pro is Google’s most sophisticated model yet, and it really represents the frontier of American AI,” Pentagon Chief Data Officer Gavin Kliger said in an interview Thursday. “And so the department is working with our engineering team together to make sure we can have this capability available across the department.” – https://www.defenseone.com/defense-systems/2026/04/pentagon-adds-googles-latest-model-genaimil-usage-soars/413126/?oref=d1-featured-river-top
Why aircraft carriers are the best (and worst) place for laser weapons
(Jared Keller – Defense News) When U.S. Navy leaders declared that “the dream of a laser on every ship can become a real one” earlier this year, they apparently had one particular ship in mind. The Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush shot down multiple drones with a high-energy laser weapon stationed on its flight deck during a first-of-its-kind live-fire test in October 2025, the Navy recently revealed. Photos published to the Defense Visual Information Distribution Service on April 20 show a 20 kilowatt Palletized High Energy Laser (P-HEL) system — based on the LOCUST Laser Weapon System from defense contractor AV and on loan from the U.S. Army’s Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) — ahead of testing in the Atlantic Ocean. The laser weapon “tracked, engaged, and neutralized multiple target drones, including drone swarms” from the deck of the Bush, AV officials said in a press release, “marking a major milestone toward fielding operational directed energy capabilities across all domains and platforms.” – https://www.defensenews.com/industry/techwatch/2026/04/28/why-aircraft-carriers-are-the-best-and-worst-place-for-laser-weapons/
What we know about the US military’s new joint laser weapon system
(Jared Keller – Defense News) The cruise missile-killing high-energy laser weapon the U.S. Defense Department envisions as part of its “Golden Dome for America” domestic missile defense shield is beginning to take shape. The new Joint Laser Weapon System — a collaboration between the U.S. Army and U.S. Navy that Laser Wars first reported about in June 2025 — will initially consist of a containerized 150-kilowatt system with the potential to scale to at least 300kw to defeat incoming cruise missile threats, according to the Navy’s fiscal 2027 budget request. The system will also include a Joint Beam Control System “capable of supporting” a 300-500kw laser weapon, the documents say. The JLWS effort will leverage research and development lessons from the Navy’s 60kw High Energy Laser with Integrated Optical-Dazzler and Surveillance (HELIOS) system, which is currently installed on the Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer USS Preble, and the Army’s 300 kw Indirect Fire Protection Capability-High Energy Laser (IFPC-HEL) system, the first prototype of which the service plans on taking delivery of later this year. – https://www.defensenews.com/newsletters/daily-news-roundup/2026/04/28/what-we-know-about-the-us-militarys-new-joint-laser-weapon-system/
Rheinmetall lands $1.2 billion German future soldier contract
(Tim Martin – Breaking Defense) European manufacturer Rheinmetall said that it has received a €1.04 billion ($1.2 billion) “call-off order” from Germany’s federal office of armed forces equipment, information technology and support (BAAINBw), covering additional Infantry Soldier of the Future — Enhanced System (IdZ-ES) kit. The call-off order — a legally binding pact between a buyer and contractor — falls under a wider framework agreement and includes delivery of 237 more platoon systems along with modernization of current ones, a statement from the Dusseldorf-based firm reads. Deliveries are planned to run between 2027 and the end of 2029. “In total, the German Bundestag has approved €1.3 billion for the project a few days ago, so further call-offs are expected,” the statement added. – https://breakingdefense.com/2026/04/rheinmetall-lands-1-2-billion-german-future-soldier-contract/