When looking for new music, it’s easy to let a streaming service’s algorithm recommend songs similar to music you already like. Those types of algorithms are the focus of new book from NBC News tech correspondent Jacob Ward. In today’s show, Ward argues that those algorithms have us in a feedback loop that may dull our critical thinking.

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Recent court rulings in France and Austria are part of a larger push in the European Union to manage how American companies use European residents’ data. Back in July 2020, European courts severed a data privacy pact between the U.S. and the EU, saying the agreement didn’t provide enough protections from surveillance. Now, the pressure is on for companies and negotiators.

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Massachusetts is the only state with an active right-to-repair law, ensuring third-party vendors and independent car repair shops can access materials and data they need to fix some modern tech. Today we’re joined by Aaron Perzanowski, a Case Western Reserve University law professor, to hear about existing and proposed legislation aimed at giving car owners greater control of their own data.

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Futurist Amy Webb is known for her predictions about the next big thing in technology and for early warnings about some of the economic and ethical considerations that go along with those advancements. Webb recently co-authored a book with geneticist Andrew Hessel called “The Genesis Machine: Our Quest to Rewrite Life in the Age of Synthetic Biology.” In it, she explores the role “synthetic biology” will play in shaping our world. It already has, in some ways, like in bringing us the mRNA vaccines we’re using to fight COVID. But in the not-so-distant future, Webb said, it will play an even bigger role in our health, what we eat and even how we have kids.

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During the pandemic, many people reached out for human connection online, leading to a boom in romance scams and “catfishing,” which is when someone fakes their identity or appearance online. Marketplace’s Kimberly Adams discussed the situation with Richard Gargan of the background check company BeenVerified, who wrote a report about the scale of the problem and how romance scammers operate.

The Smithsonian Institution’s Arts and Industries Building in Washington, D.C, is helping visitors explore how technology can, and should, shape the world of tomorrow. Marketplace producer Sasha Fernandez takes a tour of the “Futures” exhibition.

The $1.2 trillion infrastructure law President Joe Biden signed in November included $65 billion to get high-speed internet to more people. Much of that funding is expected to be channeled into rural and low-income communities. Now, exactly how all those billions will be distributed is still being worked out. But in the meantime, many states aren’t waiting. They are boosting broadband access using another pot of cash, tapping into pandemic relief funds from the American Rescue Plan Act — a law that included about $360 billion for broadband investments and support. Marketplace’s Kimberly Adams speaks with Anna Read, senior officer with the Pew Charitable Trusts’ Broadband Access Initiative, about this tactic.

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The Academy Awards used to be the battleground between major Hollywood studios. It’s now increasingly a fight between streaming services. Netflix nabbed 27 Oscar nominations on Tuesday, the most of any studio. Marketplace’s Kimberly Adams speaks with Julia Alexander, a senior strategy analyst for Parrot Analytics. She says nominations for companies like Netflix and Amazon are a sure sign of the times.

The IRS announced on Monday it’s dropping a plan to require taxpayers to sign up for and use facial recognition software. The plan had been to require people to use a service provided by a third-party company, ID.me, to verify their identities to access documents or make payments online. It was already being rolled out for people who created new online accounts this year, and was going to kick in for existing accounts by this summer. The decision comes after backlash from advocates and lawmakers over privacy concerns. Tonya Riley, a privacy and cybersecurity reporter at CyberScoop, joins Marketplace’s Kimberly Adams to discuss.

Nonfungible tokens, or NFTs, are basically digital certificates of ownership, a virtual claim that an image or gif or even a song belongs to you. And while some artists are happy to jump into this new space, others have been surprised — or furious — to find that strangers beat them to owning and selling NFTs of their work. Just last week, several musical artists publicly complained after the website HitPiece temporarily listed NFTs for their songs or albums without the artists’ permission. But does selling someone else’s art as an NFT break the law? Aram Sinnreich is a professor and chair of the communication studies division at American University. He said this gets into a gray area, at least when it comes to existing copyright law.