DOJ Sent A Grand Jury Subpoena To Twitter Demanding The Unmasking Of A Twitter User Being Sued By Devin Nunes

from the lots-of-wtf-going-on-here dept

For the past couple of years, Devin Nunes has been suing Twitter users over obviously satirical accounts that use his name, the most famous of which is "Devin Nunes' Cow." He has yet to succeed, but he has managed to clutter the courts with a bunch of vexatious litigation that, so far, has only proved Devin's skin is mighty thin and that he should definitely make better choices when it comes to choosing legal representation.

I suppose if Nunes wants to blow money on lawsuits that are doomed to fail, that's his business. Unfortunately, the victims of his bullshit lawsuits are having their time and money sucked away by a man so apparently powerless he cannot handle criticism without getting the courts involved.

But there's a new wrinkle and some new dollars being spent. This latest development -- a few months delayed thanks to a gag order -- involves the expenditure of money contributed by a whole lot of non-parties: US taxpayers. One of the last things the Trump DOJ did before it became Biden's DOJ was send Twitter a grand jury subpoena demanding identifying information from one of the Twitter accounts being sued by Nunes. (h/t Kevin Poulsen)

Given Nunes was suing individuals in civil suits, it's hard to see how or why the Department of Justice got involved, much less why this is a grand jury issue. Sure, Nunes may have made wild allegations about RICO violations and illegal impersonation, but no one has made any credible allegations about actual criminal activity, much less federal crimes.

And yet, here we are, looking at the DOJ's (granted) request [PDF] to keep Twitter from talking about this subpoena (dated November 23, 2020) and Twitter's motion [PDF] to quash the ridiculous, First Amendment threatening demand for account information.

The only thing that can be confirmed about the DOJ's (apparently ongoing) investigation is that the government believes the NunesAlt account said something threatening to someone (presumably Nunes) at some point in time. Not that the DOJ bothered to explain any of this in its subpoena.

The Gag Order prohibits Twitter from “disclos[ing] the existence of the Subpoena to any other person (except attorneys for PROVIDER for the purpose of receiving legal advice) for a period of 90 days (commencing on the date of this Order)” because it finds “reasonable grounds to believe that such disclosure will result in flight from prosecution, destruction of or tampering with evidence, intimidation of potential witnesses, and serious jeopardy to the investigation.” Schottlaender Decl., Ex. B. The Gag Order does not describe the basis for this finding, and Twitter has not received any information from the government about the “reasonable grounds” upon which the Gag Order was based.

Twitter had to approach the DOJ to get clarification. It got some, but not much.

Twitter’s counsel asked whether the government could offer any information about its investigation that may alleviate Twitter’s concerns. Counsel for the government stated that he understood Twitter’s concerns and would attempt to learn more about the investigation and about what he could share with Twitter. Shortly thereafter, the government stated that it was investigating “potential violations of 18 U.S.C. Section 875(c) (threatening communications in interstate commerce).” Twitter asked whether the government could share the threatening communications at issue, or otherwise state whether those threats had been directed to Congressman Nunes. The government replied that it would not provide any additional information about its investigation.

That's the basis for the grand jury. And without more, it seems like a pretty specious use of federal resources. Plus, as Twitter points out in its motion to dump the subpoena, this seems to be more about making critics of Nunes feel threatened than about any threats Nunes (or someone else) received.

It appears to Twitter that the Subpoena may be related to Congressman Devin Nunes’s repeated efforts to unmask individuals behind parody accounts critical of him. His efforts to suppress critical speech are as well-publicized as they are unsuccessful. He recently sued Twitter, attempting to hold it liable for speech by the parody Twitter accounts @DevinCow, @DevinNunesMom, @fireDevinNunes, and @DevinGrapes, and asking the court in that case to order Twitter to disclose information identifying those accounts. Each of these accounts were engaged in anonymous political speech critical of Congressman Nunes. That suit was dismissed against Twitter in June 2020 because Twitter cannot be liable for information originating with a third-party user of its service, but it appears to still be an active lawsuit against the Twitter users @DevinCow and @DevinNunesMom. Shortly thereafter, Twitter received the Subpoena. Public Tweets posted by the Account indicate that it may be operated by the same user as @DevinNunesMom. Congressman Nunes’s attorney also sought third-party discovery from Twitter to unmask the @DevinCow account in an entirely unrelated case.

Given Congressman Nunes’s numerous attempts to unmask his anonymous critics on Twitter—described in detail herein—Twitter is concerned that this Subpoena is but another mechanism to attack its users’ First Amendment rights. Recent litigation also alleges that Congressman Nunes may be using the government to unmask his critics. See Declaration of Hayden Schottlaender (“Schottlaender Decl.”), Ex. D. Twitter respectfully asks the Court to determine whether the government has a “compelling interest” in obtaining the Account’s basic subscriber information, or, on the other hand, is endeavoring to unmask someone merely for engaging in speech critical of Congressman Nunes.

That's really what appears to be happening here. The DOJ decided to work on the behalf of Devin Nunes, using unproven claims of issued threats as the foundation for demands for personal info. Sure, it may just be a coincidence that the DOJ is targeting one of Nunes' critics (and lawsuit defendants), but it's asking a lot from everyone to believe this coincidence had nothing to do with the Congressman's tireless support of Donald Trump and the DOJ's own obeisance to Number 45 during Bill Barr's tenure as the Attorney General.

Twitter's concern is plausible: the DOJ was mobilized to target a critic of a powerful lawmaker over what is likely protected speech. The DOJ needs to act in utmost caution in cases like this. And maybe it did. But even if it's completely in the right, Nunes and his constant suing of critics make it difficult to see this as anything other than the federal government getting into the business of keeping Devin from having his feelings hurt.

Filed Under: 1st amendment, devin nunes, doj, donald trump, intimidation, parody, satire, subpoena, unmasking, william barr
Companies: twitter

The Flopping Of Trump's Blog Proves That It's Not Free Speech He's Upset About; But Free Reach

from the it's-the-audience dept

A week ago, we wrote about Trump's new blog, which was designed to look vaguely tweet-like, noting that this proved that he never needed Twitter or Facebook to speak freely. He's always been able to speak on his own website. NBC News has an interesting story now, suggesting that the blog just isn't getting that much attention.

A week since the unveiling, social media data suggests things are not going well.

The ex-president’s blog has drawn a considerably smaller audience than his once-powerful social media accounts, according to engagement data compiled with BuzzSumo, a social media analytics company. The data offers a hint that while Trump remains a political force, his online footprint is still dependent on returning to Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

The Desk of Donald J. Trump is limited — users can’t comment or engage with the actual posts beyond sharing them to other platforms, an action few people do, according to the data.

Some have been using this to argue that Twitter and Facebook's bans on the former president were attacks on his "free speech." But it actually demonstrates something different -- and important. Everyone complaining about the removal of Trump's account are not actually mad about the "free speech" part of it. They're really mad about the "free reach." (Hat tip to Renee DiResta for making this point years ago).

Being kicked off these platforms by the platforms (as opposed to, say, the government) is not an attack on your ability to speak. There are lots of places to do that. It is, instead, an attack on having easy access to an audience on those platforms. And, as far as I can tell, there is no right to having as large an audience as possible. Thus, in the same sense that I can't demand a million followers on any of these platforms, the former president similarly can't demand that they supply him with the audience of their users.

Filed Under: access, audience, content moderation, donald trump, free reach, free speech
Companies: facebook, twitter

Publix Gets Social Media Accounts Advertising Its Sandwiches Taken Down For Some Reason

from the biting-the-hand dept

For sure, the most frustrating examples of dumb trademark disputes are when one party bullies into silence another party for doing something that actually helps the bully. If you need an example of this, you can look to the time Olive Garden tried to take down AllOfGarden.com, a site with a satirical take on the Olive Garden menu. That example is particularly instructive for two reasons. First, AllOfGarden was essentially a tongue-in-cheek love letter to the restaurant chain run by someone who was very much a fan of said chain. Second, Olive Garden eventually apologized and rescinded its threat, due in part to the public backlash and the fact that it must certainly have realized that the site, if anything, helped drive some measure of interest in the restaurant itself.

We will have to see if supermarket chain Publix ends up handling this the same way, because it has apparently bullied someone running social media accounts alerting fans to the availability of a particular sandwich into silence.

The account “Are Publix Chicken Tender Subs On Sale?” — with nearly 40,000 followers — has been dormant since March 11. One of its final tweets noted that the subs were, indeed, on sale, and added ominously: “This may be our last Tweet.” Since then, it stopped sharing updates altogether. An accompanying Facebook page also went silent.

A big clue about what happened: In another post, the Twitter account said it had received a cease-and-desist order from Publix objecting to a related text-message notification service. The account promised more details “later this week,” but never shared more information. Since then, dozens of hungry Twitter users have tweeted at the account asking where they went, whether everything was OK and earnestly asking which subs might be on sale.

So, who is behind the social media accounts and text messaging service? A 26 years old named Bryan Dickey who also works for marketing firm Postscript in California. According to Dickey, Publix contacted him upset that his texting and social media accounts were alerting the public as to when these chicken tender sandwiches went on sale. He had initially said he was going to keep his social media accounts running while taking down the text message service, but those socials have, again, since gone silent. To be clear, this was something of a commercial operation, though admittedly not much of one.

Dickey tweeted from his personal account earlier this month that Publix was objecting to a related text-message service he set up in January that allowed users to be notified about sub sales if they texted “PUBSUB” to a listed phone number. It wasn’t clear how Dickey was profiting from the service, but apparently that was too much for Publix. He said as early as January 2018 that he was making money off his Publix subs ventures and last year said he had made more than $5,000.

“Publix is bullying me with C&D’s for the SMS VIP club. Haven’t talked about it publicly yet. Basically all paths to profitability are legal red taped for now, but I can keep the socials running,” he said.

All the normal excuses for Publix's actions are trotted out in the Tampabay.com post by third parties on the chain's behalf. If the Twitter account or text service suddenly did something offensive, Publix would get the blame. If it didn't go after the use of its name in this case, someone else could argue that Publix had abandoned its trademark.

But as we've discussed before, there are other options beyond bullying to death something like this. Working out a way to make the service or social media accounts "legitimate" through cheap or free licenses alleviates the concern about trademark abandonment. Working out an arrangement would similarly allow some flavor of quality control over the content of these accounts.

Or, as Publix chose to do, it could silence activity that was actively promoting its own products, almost certainly leading to sales that would have otherwise not occurred.

Filed Under: bryan dickey, chicken tender subs, trademark, trademark bullying
Companies: publix, twitter

James O'Keefe Sues Twitter For Defamation... For Shutting Down His Account

from the this-is-not-going-to-go-well dept

You may have heard recently that James O'Keefe, the guy behind "Project Veritas" -- a propaganda outlet whose brand of highly edited, surreptitiously recorded videos are often followed by actual media having to come in and debunk the misleading bits -- had his Twitter account shut down recently. He immediately threatened to sue Twitter, and last week he actually did so.

The crux of the lawsuit is that because a reporter claimed that Twitter told him O'Keefe's account was banned for "operating fake accounts," that's defamation. The lawsuit notes that back in February, Twitter also banned the Project Veritas account. In that case, it was because one of Project Veritas' videos allegedly revealed "private information" which violated its rules. In that case, the private information (according to the lawsuit) was that the video showed the house number of a Facebook executive who they were trying to interview. In the lawsuit, O'Keefe's lawyers try to make a big deal of the fact that real media organizations sometimes show where people live as well, leaving out the fact that this does not matter one tiny bit. Twitter sets the rules on its own platform, and when it's making decisions on the rules, they often involve context (and that context may include Project Veritas' long history).

But the key part of the lawsuit is the claim that because a Twitter spokesperson told the media that O'Keefe violated its policy against "fake accounts," and O'Keefe claims he didn't operate fake accounts, this is defamatory. The arguments in the case are going to make some of you laugh:

The false accusation that Mr. O’Keefe operated “fake accounts” is particularly damaging for Mr. O’Keefe because Mr. O’Keefe is a journalist. As such, his reputation for transparency and accurate reporting is fundamental to his profession.

That is... uh... not quite what many people would call Mr. O'Keefe's reputation.

By accusing Mr. O’Keefe of “operating fake accounts,” Twitter was directly attacking Mr. O’Keefe’s fitness for his profession by accusing him of “misleading others” and by effectively running a disinformation outlet akin to the much-discussed “Russian interference”/disinformation bots that plagued the 2016 election and which inspired some political operatives to engage in similar tactics in 2017....

Indeed, Twitter’s entire “fake accounts” policy, which it accused Mr. O’Keefe of violating by stating that he “operat[ed] fake accounts,” stems from the Russian disinformation campaign.

Thus, by claiming Mr. O’Keefe operated “fake accounts,” Twitter was saying Mr. O’Keefe could not be trusted as a journalist because he was “misleading others” via disinformation in the manner the Russian government is widely accused of doing to interfere in the U.S. political process.

That all sounds nice. But if you actually read the Twitter policy in question, it's a lot broader than O'Keefe's lawyers make it out to be. It's quite broad and has to do with a lot more than Russian disinfo accounts. Here's just part of it:

You may not use Twitter’s services in a manner intended to artificially amplify or suppress information or engage in behavior that manipulates or disrupts people’s experience on Twitter.

We want Twitter to be a place where people can make human connections, find reliable information, and express themselves freely and safely. To make that possible, we do not allow spam or other types of platform manipulation. We define platform manipulation as using Twitter to engage in bulk, aggressive, or deceptive activity that misleads others and/or disrupts their experience.

Platform manipulation can take many forms and our rules are intended to address a wide range of prohibited behavior, including:

• commercially-motivated spam, that typically aims to drive traffic or attention from a conversation on Twitter to accounts, websites, products, services, or initiatives;
• inauthentic engagements, that attempt to make accounts or content appear more popular or active than they are;
• coordinated activity, that attempts to artificially influence conversations through the use of multiple accounts, fake accounts, automation and/or scripting; and
• coordinated harmful activity that encourages or promotes behavior which violates the Twitter Rules.

In other words, it's quite broad. And lots of people have been caught up in similar account bans over the past few years, including the Krassenstein brothers who became famous for their anti-Donald Trump tweets, as well as a weird (and somewhat silly) "non-partisan" political party. So, for anyone arguing that this policy is used just against "conservatives," the evidence certainly suggests otherwise. It also does not at all suggest that anyone dinged under this policy is engaged in Russian-style disinformation campaigns.

Like so many of these lawsuits, this one appears to be more performative than serious. It's not difficult to predict how this will end up.

Filed Under: content moderation, defamation, fake accounts, first amendment, free speech, james o'keefe, policies
Companies: project veritas, twitter

Ajit Pai Should Not Still Have His Government Twitter Account

from the left-the-agency-but-kept-his-followers dept

You are probably familiar with Ajit Pai, the former head of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) famous for killing net neutrality rules, doing the Harlem Shake in a Daily Caller video, and drinking from an oversized coffee mug to appear funny and relatable.

You may be less familiar with Ajit Pai’s work on Twitter. Pai is proud of his Twitter use, and he likes to brag that he was the “first [FCC] Commissioner on Twitter” (he set up @ajitpaiFCC the day he joined the FCC). Pai has sent over 31,000 tweets since creating his account in 2012.

But there’s something different about his account recently. Pai’s FCC account was created when he joined the FCC, and he used it to discuss his FCC work. After Pai resigned on January 20, 2021, the common practice at other agencies would be for Pai to stop using @AjitPaiFCC, since he was no longer Ajit Pai at the FCC. But instead, Pai removed “FCC” from his handle and kept tweeting.

Pai isn’t the first former FCC commissioner to do this. Former Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Mike O’Rielly also seem to have kept the accounts they created at the FCC.

That may not be legal. Let’s use Pai as an example:

Ajit Pai Created His Twitter for Government Work

While Ajit Pai was at the FCC, his Twitter account was his official persona. He created his account on his first day at the FCC and put “FCC” in his handle. His profile listed his position and linked to his FCC webpage. He tweeted about FCC work while sitting in the FCC building during FCC business hours. And the FCC linked his Twitter account on the FCC website next to his other government accounts, like his FCC email address and blog.

Source: January 18, 2013 capture from the Wayback Machine

When government officials use social media for government work, they have to follow rules around public records preservation and limits on what they can say. The National Archives issued guidance on this way back in 2013. Some officials use personal accounts to tweet about sports or food and go out of their way to emphasize when the account is personal, like “tweets my own” or “not an official account.”

Pai didn’t do that: this was his work account. He tweeted about the FCC “making progress” on 911 dialing from hotels, shared his official FCC remarks about the FCC’s Lifeline program, and criticized an FCC decision he disagreed with. Not every tweet was about the FCC (he wished Bob Barker a happy birthday), but it was pretty clear that a tweet from @ajitpaiFCC was from the Ajit Pai appointed to the FCC by the president and not Ajit Pai the fun dad.

Instead of closing his FCC Twitter account (@AjitPaiFCC) when he left the FCC and moving to his existing personal one (@AjitPai), he kept both and changed their names. His government account, with 83,000 followers, became @AjitPai, and his personal account with fewer than 3,000 followers became @AjitPai_.

There are two problems with that. First, when Pai used the FCC account, his tweets were public records, subject to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The FCC has to preserve the tweets for a set time period to comply with the law. With Pai controlling the account, the FCC can’t stop Pai from deleting old tweets whenever he wants. Second, because the account was created on government time for government use, it is government property. It was not Pai’s to take.

Ajit Pai’s Tweets Are Public Records, and You Have a Right to See Them

When government employees create material for government business, like emails or reports, those documents are federal records. Under the Federal Records Act, records must be saved for a set time period. An email from a low-level government employee might be saved for a few years, but communications from high-level officials are special and may need to be saved forever by the National Archives. The five FCC commissioners run the agency, so you would expect their official statements on social media to be treated as important records.

Most agencies deal with this by controlling the official’s Twitter account after that person leaves. This preserves the official communications from the then-public official to the public about their public service. That’s why if you look at Twitter accounts from former federal leaders, you’ll see that almost all of them are inactive.

Except Pai’s.

One of these things is not like the others (it’s @AjitPai)

Ajit Pai, now a private citizen, still has control over the records he created while serving as a public official. Usually, the First Amendment prevents government accounts from blocking social media critics. If you want to interact with his old FCC tweets, you better hope he didn’t block you for disagreeing with him in the past.

Or, if you’re me, two weeks after filing a FOIA request for Pai’s tweets you’ll see this:

It is harder to write about federal records when you are blocked from seeing them.

This isn’t how federal records law works. Pai’s tweets are public records and belong under FCC control. But judging from the FCC’s response to my FOIA, the FCC has decided that Pai can keep his account as long as the FCC can download copies of his old tweets.

The FCC is wrong: (A) if you download your own Twitter data, you’ll see it doesn’t include information like the text of tweets Pai responded to or which accounts he blocked, and (B) federal records are the original documents created by public officials, not copies. If Ajit Pai wanted to keep his tweets, the law allows him to download his FCC Twitter data as copies of his records (subject to approval by the agency). The law does not allow the public to be left with inferior downloaded copies while Pai keeps the originals.

Fun fact: when I filed a FOIA request for Pai’s tweets, the FCC responded that it was building a webpage to host Pai’s old tweets on the FCC website. So instead of the FCC keeping the @AjitPaiFCC account and leaving it up for the public (which is free), it is spending taxpayer money to build new website so Pai can capitalize on his 83,000 followers.

Pai Does Not Own His Official Twitter Account and Should Not Profit From It

Most federal agencies(other than the FCC) recognize that when government officials create Twitter accounts to communicate in their official role as public servants, those accounts are government property. For example, the Defense Department has clear rules warning that social media account created for government use, including accounts with the name and position of an official (say, @AjitPaiFCC), are federal property and belong to the agency. The Department of Interior also has social media rules warning federal employees that social media accounts for “official personas” used for “official business and maintained using government resources (staff time, devices, etc.) are the property of the federal government.” The National Archives specifically says the best practice is to create “create unique agency-administered accounts when an employee begins using social media for official purposes.” Pai did just that, creating a second handle when he joined the FCC and using it for FCC business.

Wow some of these highlighted details sound very familiar. Source: Department of Defense

When something belongs to the government, you can’t take it for yourself. There are regulations that prohibit government employees from misusing government property, and there are other regulations that prohibit using a public position for private benefit.

Why are those rules important? Well, imagine if a former official wrote a book and wanted to plug it to journalists who followed their government work. Ajit Pai’s FCC Twitter account is pretty valuable: it has 80,000 more followers than his personal one. That’s a lot of people to profit from.

If you wanted to announce a book, which follower count would you use?

Or take former FCC Commissioner Clyburn, who kept her account after she left the FCC in 2018. Her account still hosts her FCC tweets, like her dissent on Pai’s final decision to kill the net neutrality rules. A few months after Clyburn left the FCC, T-Mobile hired Clyburn to lobby in favor of its acquisition of Sprint, which required approval by … the FCC. And now Clyburn tweets favorably about T-Mobile’s corporate work on the same account she once used for FCC business.

These tweets should not be on the same account.

Not every FCC commissioner has done this. Former FCC Chair Tom Wheeler did the right thing and closed his account. He then directed interested followers to his personal account.

Source: https://twitter.com/TomWheelerFCC

But the other three former commissioners face the constant temptation to use accounts created for public service for personal profit. These three commissioners — Pai, O’Rielly, and Clyburn — should not have kept their FCC Twitter accounts. And the FCC, which knows about this issue and allowed it to fester, should have created policies to prevent this from happening in the first place.

Your right to see statements by FCC commissioners should not depend on whether they block you after changing jobs.

Mark Gray is a lawyer in Washington, D.C. who writes about technology policy issues in his spare time. He is available on Twitter at @Mark_T_Gray. The views in this piece are entirely his own and do not reflect the views of his employer, the United States, or any of its agencies.

Filed Under: ajit pai, archives, fcc, government property, mignon clyburn, mike o'rielly, tom wheeler, transparency, twitter accounts
Companies: twitter

Senators Warn Feebly Regulated Ad Data Is Being Exploited By Governments Worldwide

from the too-profitable-to-care dept

Back when the whole TikTok hysteria was taking root, we noted how people were generally obsessing over the wrong things. Yes, there are concerns about what a Chinese company does with your data. But there was nothing TikTok was doing that was particularly unique in an adtech sector that's massively complex, sees little meaningful regulatory oversight, isn't big on the whole ethical behavior thing, operates in many countries with no real internet privacy laws, and is comprised of thousands of foreign and domestic app makers, data brokers, telecoms, tech giants, and others -- all dashing toward a hugely profitable trough.

Last week, a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers warned that this entire ecosystem is being exploited by governments around the world. There's simply so much data being collected, and efforts to secure this data (if you hadn't noticed from the steady parade of hacks, breaches, leaks, and avoidable fuck ups) aren't particularly consistent:

"This information would be a goldmine for foreign intelligence services that could exploit it to inform and supercharge hacking, blackmail, and influence campaigns," a letter signed by Senators Ron Wyden, Mark Warner, Kirsten Gillibrand, Sherrod Brown, Elizabeth Warren, and Bill Cassidy, reads. The lawmakers sent the letter last week to AT&T, Verizon, Google, Twitter, and a number of other companies that maintain advertisement platforms."

The Senators seemed particularly concerned about "bidstream" data, which offers detailed insights into users and is collected by a long list of companies during the ad auction process, even if said companies don't win the bid for that particular ad placement. Much like location, clickstream, and other data, bidstream data is then being sold to pretty much any idiot with a nickel, with nothing in the way of meaningful oversight, the lawmakers warned:

"Few Americans realize that some auction participants are siphoning off and storing 'bidstream' data to compile exhaustive dossiers about them. In turn, these dossiers are being openly sold to anyone with a credit card, including to hedge funds, political campaigns, and even to governments," the letter continued."

Granted as the steady parade of location data scandals routinely show, bidstream data is just a tiny part of this messy ecosystem. And the US government is itself part of the problem. Israeli surveillance companies Rayzone and Bsightful routinely sell this data. Companies like Venntel also sell this data, frequently to US government agencies like ICE. Experts warn that Congressional oversight into this arena is long overdue given the potential for widespread abuse:

"This is a deeply problematic practice when Western governments are abusing the data flows, and it becomes a national security emergency when these same global advertising companies are not vetting their own partners," Zach Edwards, a researcher who has closely followed the supply chain of various sources of data, told Motherboard in an online chat.

"It's long overdue for Congress to begin asking the largest tech companies in the world tough questions about their real-time-data-breach technology that underpins global advertising auctions and user data supply chains," Edwards continued. "Every time a person loads a website or a mobile app, it's likely that their data is being shared with at least dozens of companies, and when that user is interacting with an app or site with banner ads, typically several thousand companies could be receiving data about that visit in order to give those companies 'the opportunity to bid to show ads to that user.'"

The US government's love of ad data as a way to tap dance around warrants reduces any incentive for meaningful oversight of the sector, which is why "investigations" routinely end with few meaningful changes. When you have a universe of connected industries and governments all happily exploiting a single market and lobbying against meaningful change, it begins to make more sense why the US can't even pass a basic internet privacy law. But it also shouldn't be hard to see why obsessing exclusively about TikTok (which wound up being more about cronyism than privacy and security) was a waste of time in broader context.

Filed Under: ad data, bill cassidy, data, elizabeth warren, kirsten gillibrand, mark warner, ron wyden, sherrod brown
Companies: at&t, google, twitter, verizon