Big tech companies tend to make a lot of enemies — but there are none more powerful than the US government. Apple, Google, Amazon, and Meta are regularly called in front of Congress to fend off monopoly accusations — and lawmakers bring up bills to rein in the companies just as often. The Federal Trade Commission has taken a particularly central role, leading a lawsuit to sever Facebook and Instagram while blocking new acquisitions for Oculus and the company’s virtual reality wing. Like it or not, these regulatory fights will play a huge role in deciding the future of tech — and neither side is playing nice.
MS NOW reports that content creators were offered $1,500 to make videos attacking Kat Abughazaleh, a former journalist now running for office in Illinois’s 9th Congressional District. The offer came from a group called Democracy Unmuted, which has since updated its website to attack the MS NOW reporter who broke the story.
Search-and-rescue operations lacked access to pinpoint data on where tornadoes touched down, because Kristi Noem’s DHS spending policies are holding up approval of a $200k contract, reports CNN:
As the storms spread, officials from several states started contacting FEMA, asking why they couldn’t access the tornado tracking data… As of earlier this week, the tornado mapping contract still had not been renewed, the two sources said.
The decision reverses a 2024 order for TikTok to shut down its operations in the country, and comes after an agreement that TikTok will implement “enhanced protection” for Canadians’ personal information.
The Canadian Security Intelligence Service, which previously warned against using TikTok, said Canadians should “proceed cautiously” when joining new platforms and “conduct their own research on the type of data being collected,” CTV News reports.
In a court filing, US Customs and Border Protection official Brandon Lord says parts of the agency’s new refund processing system are currently 40 to 80 percent complete. According to Lord, the CBP will begin “performance testing in the next few weeks.”
The CBP previously estimated that the system would be done in April, as its existing tech wasn’t equipped to handle $166 billion in refunds.
Techdirt’s Mike Masnick on the history of the NSA and mass surveillance in America, and why Anthropic’s fight with the Pentagon should worry us.
You can find more details on the tech billionaire-backed plan to build a new 400,000-resident city in Northern California in this episode of the Volts podcast. Host David Roberts is interviewing its leader, former Goldman Sachs trader Jan Sramek, and in this first segment, starts to dive into things like water, urban design, and wildfires.
”The hacker expressed disgust at the presence of child abuse images on the device and left a message threatening to turn its owner over to the FBI, the person said.” Apparently they didn’t realize they were on an FBI server.
During an interview with Bloomberg, Emil Michael, the under secretary of defense for research and engineering, says Anthropic’s move to sue the Pentagon was an “expected reaction” to its designation as a supply-chain risk.
“I don’t think there’s a scenario where this gets resolved in that way,” Michael says, Bloomberg reports.
We have no reason to believe that Live Nation is about to bankroll a Broadway spectacular based on the First Lady just because it managed to settle with the DoJ. We’re just saying, it feels like there’s a precedent.
Bebopper:
In unrelated news. “Melania: The Musical” will start a nationwide tour in April. The BBC reports that Ticketmaster has invested $100 million in the venture, with shows scheduled at some of the nation’s biggest venues.
Get the day’s best comment and more in my free newsletter, The Verge Daily.
Bloomberg reports Apple manufactured 55 million iPhones in India in 2025, up from 36 million a year before, following a concerted effort to move production after Trump’s tariffs. Its aim is reportedly to build the 60 million annual US iPhone sales to India by the end of this year.
Elon Musk’s short-lived agency rolled into the NEH with the mandate to cancel grants that it deemed contrary to Donald Trump’s anti-DEI agenda. According to the New York Times, decisions about which grants to cancel weren’t made after careful analysis and deliberation. Instead, they were made with a ChatGPT prompt.
… instead of looking closely at funded projects, they pulled short summaries off the internet and fed them into the A.I. chatbot.
The prompt was simple: “Does the following relate at all to D.E.I.? Respond factually in less than 120 characters. Begin with ‘Yes’ or ‘No.’” The results were sweeping, and sometimes bizarre.
[New York Times]
Caitlin Kalinowski posted on X that she resigned from OpenAI, saying the company’s contract didn’t do enough to protect Americans from warrantless surveillance and that granting AI “lethal autonomy without human authorization” was a line that “deserved more deliberation.”
The Financial Times reports Palmer Luckey’s ModRetro is in talks to raise funds at a $1 billion valuation, which sounds like a lot for a retro gaming company.
The report also claims that Anduril, his other business selling drones and autonomous weapons to the military, happens to be at the same time in talks with investors for a new funding round valuing it at $60 billion. Interesting.
Fresh off another round of controversial bets, accusations of insider trading, and general profiting off human suffering, the two biggest prediction markets are seeking fresh funds. According to the Wall Street Journal, both companies are trying to lure investors at a valuation of $20 billion, nearly twice last year’s.
[The Wall Street Journal]
As drone strikes hit the city, social media videos shared by influencers follow a script: nonchalance at the danger, followed by flattering videos and photos of UAE leaders. “I know who protects us,” the videos go.
TikTok trend or a coordinated influence campaign?
The designation from the US Department of War — that’s busy disrupting actual supply chains and human life in several countries — is having the inverse effect of driving up demand for Claude, which has been breaking daily signup records since early last week in every country where Claude is available.
AppFigures data also shows it topping App Store charts for free and AI apps in dozens of countries, including the US, Canada, and much of Europe.
In a blog post, CEO Dario Amodei confirmed reports that the Defense Department had sent them a letter formally designating them a supply-chain risk, and said Anthropic planned to challenge them in court. He also clarified how it would currently impact Claude users:
The language used by the Department of War in the letter (even supposing it was legally sound) matches our statement on Friday that the vast majority of our customers are unaffected by a supply chain risk designation. With respect to our customers, it plainly applies only to the use of Claude by customers as a direct part of contracts with the Department of War, not all use of Claude by customers who have such contracts.
After overseeing many months of brutal immigration crackdowns, sending ICE to occupy Minneapolis, and fending off backroom attempts to get President Donald Trump to fire her, the controversial Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (and dog anti-enthusiast) has been shuffled out of DHS.
So what will her replacement, Republican Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin, be like as DHS secretary? Well, he once challenged the head of the Teamsters Union to a fistfight in the middle of a Senate hearing, so, there’s that.
Kalshi and Polymarket are cosplaying as the news, even as gambling on Iran, Venezuela, and nuclear war runs rampant.
Carr says the FCC will hold a vote this month on reforms to encourage companies to bring call centers to the US. The agency will also look into a proposal that would “require call takers to be proficient in American Standard English.”
I’ve been updating it for hours with bits from court documents, blog posts, email fact-checks, even a quick interview with Google Android boss Sameer Samat and Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney. I’m about done, but I still need to parse the new Games Level Up Program and Apps Experience Program...
“The parties expect to submit a revised proposal to the Court by March 4, 2026.” That’s today.
Judge Donato seemed extremely skeptical of the previous proposed settlement during the live courtroom proceedings, particularly because Epic and Google had quietly worked out a new $800 million business deal behind the scenes. We’re standing by for the “revised proposal” now.
The site seems to be drawing a line at betting on nuclear war. Even though Polymarket has allowed betting on whether or not there would be a nuclear detonation in a particular year previously, the possibility of a nuclear apocalypse in 2026 might be just a bit too real. According to 404 Media:
For a few hours on Tuesday, Polymarket hosted a bet about the possibility of nuclear war in 2026. The market asked the question “Nuclear weapon detonation by …?” and racked up close to a million dollars in trading volume before Polymarket took the unusual step to remove the market from its website.
The Pro-Human Declaration has been signed by the American Federation of Teachers, the Congress of Christian Leaders, the Progressive Democrats of America, and Steve Bannon.
Reserves can offset short-term disruptions to the global market. Beyond that, higher prices could encourage American companies to ramp up production in coming months.
Trump campaigned on a promise to “drill,” promoting “American energy dominance.” Asked if he’s worried about oil prices ahead of US strikes on Iran, Trump responded, “I’m not concerned … I’m concerned about long term health for this country.”
While Trump’s federal regulators are seemingly in the bag for Larry Ellison’s big dumb gift to his large adult son, The New York Times notes that state attorneys general can sue to block mergers in the US, and EU regulators will have a say since properties like HBO Max and CNN are offered globally.
