Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana — #86

Hey,

Today, I want to spend some time on proposed legislation in the European Union that would allow for mass surveillance of citizens. Lawmakers in the United Kingdom have a similar proposal on the agenda, so it is just as relevant if you’re based there.

And yes, you should care.

The European Commission is working on a legislative proposal called chat control that would scan every device in the hunt for child sexual abuse material. If the law goes into effect, EU citizens will have all their communications monitored and audited — “encrypted” communication will no longer be possible since all chat and email providers must allow for scanning by law enforcement.

Lawmakers claim that the purpose of this law is to detect serious crimes, often using “child pornography” as the emotional hook that makes it hard to oppose it. But the problem is that once such a massive surveillance system is in place, those in power can choose to change what to listen to at any time. So, if a government changes the law and has access to all your emails and chat data, you might get in trouble overnight. I think the abortion ban in the United States showed us that is not an unlikely scenario.

Privacy is a human right.

Someone I cannot recall once said, “I’m not doing anything illegal when I’m in the bathroom either, but I still want to close the door”. To me, that is what privacy is all about.

Also, research shows that the suggested law is a terrible way to stop child pornography. Numbers published by the German Federal Office of Justice show that in Germany, more than 47.3 per cent of the ordered telecommunications surveillance in 2019 was due to suspected drug-related offences. Only 0.1 per cent of the orders concerned “child pornography”.

The EU know this is a bad idea. This week, the European Parliament's Scientific Service released a report where the legal experts conclude: "when weighing the fundamental rights affected by the measures of the […] proposal, it can be established that the […] proposal would violate Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights with regard to users."

We can and should do many things to reduce the number of children at risk of sexual abuse, but “chat control” is not one of them. According to the European Union itself, “Between 70% and 85% of children know their abuser. The vast majority of children are victims of people they trust.” Unfortunately, scanning all chat traffic in Europe will do little to help prevent child sexual abuse within the family, a sports club, or at school.

This law would make it impossible for EU citizens not to be surveilled. If you chose not to care, at least you were aware.

Enjoy the rest of the reading!

Anna

Boycott and bomb threats against Bud Light after campaign with transgender actress

POLITICS / BUSINESS

Over the last two weeks, Bud Light has faced intense hate from right-wing personalities and news outlets like Fox News over a can of beer. Transgender actress and influencer Dylan Mulvaney, who has performed in the “Book of Mormon” musical, published a video on April 1 promoting Bud Light and showing off a beer can personalized with an image of her face to celebrate the first anniversary of her coming out.

The right-wing backlash occurred within hours after Mulvaney published the video on Instagram, and Bud Light’s parent company, Anheuser-Busch, was seemingly worried early on. A Budweiser distributor cancelled a promotional event in Missouri, citing employee safety concerns, late that week. And on Thursday, multiple emails were sent to Anheuser-Busch saying that bombs had been placed at various company locations. 

On Friday, Anheuser-Busch CEO Brendan Whitworth issued a vaguely apologetic statement on social media wishing to reduce the hate aimed at Bud Light and its parent company. However, it seemingly satisfied no one.

“We never intended to be part of a discussion that divides people. We are in the business of bringing people together over a beer,” Brendan Whitworth wrote in a statement published on the company’s Twitter account. Full of allusions to his military service and the company’s “history and heritage” in “America’s heartland,” the letter never mentioned the boycott or Mulvaney or explained what initiated Whitworth to write it.

A few high-profile right-wing voices have amplified the boycott. 90s rocker Kid Rock posted a video of himself shooting a few cases of Bud Light, which he presumably paid for. “Fuck Bud Light, and fuck Anheuser-Busch,” he said, “have a terrific day.” And the country singer Travis Tritt said he would drop Anheuser-Busch from his tour and seemed to blame Bud Light’s Mulvaney deal on Europe.

Four days after Mulvaney posted her Bud Light video, she announced a paid partnership with Nike in an Instagram post where she modelled leggings and a sports bra. This collaboration caused former Olympians Sharron Davies and Caitlyn Jenner (who is transgender herself) to criticize the brand.

Montana becomes the first state to pass a bill banning TikTok downloads for private citizens

INTERNET / GEOPOLITICS

On Friday, lawmakers in Montana passed a bill blocking TikTok downloads. The bill will make it illegal for app stores to allow users to download the app and illegal for TikTok as a company to operate within the state.

The bill does not make it illegal for people to use TikTok if they already have the app installed. But it is still the most significant action by any state against the Chinese app yet. An earlier version of the bill sought to force internet providers to block the app, rather than app stores blocking downloads, but that language was later removed.

Montana Governor Greg Gianforte, a Republican, is now expected to sign the bill. Gianforte previously banned TikTok on government devices in Montana. An action that many other US state has since then followed.

The bill referred to data safety concerns, surveillance from the Chinese government and minors engaging in “dangerous activities” due to TikTok use. For example, activities like “cooking chicken in NyQuil” and “attempting to climb stacks of milkcrates”.

If passed, the app ban in Montana would go into effect in 2024. However, there is yet to be a feasible plan for executing a ban, and a court will most likely decide if a ban is legal. Critics argue that a ban on TikTok would infringe upon free speech rights. And suggest that if data privacy were a genuine concern, the government would begin by passing a federal data privacy law.

Last month, the Biden administration gave TikTok’s Chinese parent company ByteDance an ultimatum: divest ownership or face a federal ban. TikTok has responded with a charm offensive, trying to sway US lawmakers. Unfortunately, that strategy seems to do little to change the optics.

Not making the Forbes “30 under 30” seems like the better strategy

BUSINESS

Sam Bankman-Fried, Elizabeth Holmes, Adam Neumann and now … Charlie Javice. Forbes has an impressive track record of identifying the future scammers of America.

Sam Bankman-Fried, the disgraced founder of doomed cryptocurrency platform FTX, was included on Forbes’s “30 Under 30” list in 2021 and was on the cover of the “Forbes 400” issue that same year. SBF is currently facing up to 115 years in prison over charges stemming from the spectacular collapse of FTX in November 2022. Charges include lying to investors and taking billions of dollars of his customers’ money for his personal use. The trial starts in October.

Elizabeth Holmes has also been on the cover. At 30, Forbes named her the world’s youngest self-made woman billionaire – worth $4.5 billion – in 2014. She also received the Under 30 Doers Award from Forbes and was ranked 73 in its 2015 list of “the world’s most powerful women”. In January 2022, Holmes was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison last year after she was found guilty on four counts of defrauding investors.

Another questionable list alumni of the “30 Under 30” is the “Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli, who made it on the list in 2012. He became infamous in 2015 after jacking up the price of a single pill of the prescription medication Daraprim from $13.50 to $750 while serving as CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals. Later, Shkreli was sentenced to seven years in prison and a lifetime ban from the pharmaceutical industry after being convicted of defrauding investors.

Forbes also placed WeWork founder Adam Neumann on its cover before his public downfall. And just days before it collapsed, Forbes named Silicon Valley Bank one of “America’s Best Banks”.

This week, another Forbes honoree joined the group of fraudsters. Charlie Javice, 31, founder of the financial aid startup Frank, made the Forbes “30 Under 30” list in 2019. She is now charged with multiple counts of fraud, allegedly using fake customer data to get JPMorgan Chase to buy her startup for $175 million.

“When fortunes change or new details are discovered, we are among the first to report on the news,” Forbes said in a statement. And if the lists are about securing its future readership, the strategy seems successful. But if they want you on the cover, you should probably decline — or start to prepare what to tell the feds.

Double-check the headlines

Just making sure you didn’t miss any major world events this week.

• Sudan’s leading paramilitary group RSF and the regular armed forces exchanged gunfire in Khartoum and elsewhere in the country in a struggle for control.

• In the United States, a 21-year-old Massachusetts Air National Guard member leaked many classified documents to a Discord chat group.

• Norway expelled 15 Russian diplomats suspected of spying while working at the Russian Embassy in Oslo.

• The International Monetary Fund cut its GDP forecasts, saying the global economy is heading for the weakest growth since 1990.

• After months of protests, French President Emmanuel Macron signed the controversial pension changes into law, raising the retirement age from 62 to 64. On Thursday, protestors stormed the Paris headquarters of the luxury goods company LVMH.

• United States President Joe Biden visited Northern Ireland and Ireland to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday peace agreement.

• Japanese prime minister, Fumio Kishida, escaped unhurt after an explosive device allegedly targeted him on Saturday.

• Russian oil exports are above pre-Ukraine war levels as India and China buy 90% of Moscow’s crude oil—1.5 million barrels per day, each.

• The United States and Vietnam want to boost their relations, with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visiting Hanoi. But China is not pleased.

One long

The New Yorker

The Privacy-Minded Social Network at the Center of the Classified-Document Leak

A young National Guardsman posted hundreds of secret government files to a private Discord group. Then they sat there for months unnoticed.

Five short

1. Watch

Ten years ago yesterday, on April 15, 2013, a terror attack occurred during the annual Boston Marathon. Two homemade pressure cooker bombs detonated 14 seconds and 190 m apart at 13:49, near the race’s finish line, killing three people and injuring hundreds of others, including 17 who lost limbs.

The Boston Marathon bombings were the first time the mainstream public consumed a news event in real-time on social media. But one 2013 study showed that 29% of the most viral content shared in the days after the bombing was false information or rumours, and another 50% were just opinions or feelings, not facts.

Several rumours from social media, like a Reddit rumour that said a missing student at Brown University was the main suspect, were reported as fact by major news outlets that simply couldn’t handle the speed of new media.

This week, Netflix released a mini-documentary series about the event.

2. Listen

Season 3 of the podcast Articles of Interest focuses on the fashion trend of American Ivy (also known as “peppy”) that seems to come back repeatedly. The host, Avery Trufelman, starts at the very beginning and follows the trend into the future and gives us a lesson in world history, men’s fashion, jazz, Japan, the women’s movement, youth culture, right-wing extremism, and trend creation.

It was the most enjoyable podcast experience I’ve had in a very long time.

3. Remember

We always have more options in life than it seems at first. I’ve been going back and forth the last few weeks, trying to choose between two seemingly opposite alternatives. But after breaking it down, I realised I had many more options than I thought, with a lot higher payoff.

4. Change

Swap your old-fashioned deodorant for one of these refillable ones from Wild. I changed over a year ago, and I’m not going back. It comes in multiple scents, without alcohol or aluminium, and cases in pretty colours.

5. Try

The app StyleBook keeps track of your closet, helps you find new inspiring outfits from what you already own, and calculates each garment’s cost per wear. I’m a newbie and am still cataloguing everything I own, but long-term users say they have improved their style while shopping less.

Thank you for reading! Every time a post gets shared, it makes me very happy. /Anna