Tech4Evil

In our special coverage of the 2023 Oslo Freedom Forum Manal and I got to meet some truly inspirational African delegates who are shaping the way technology serves human rights on the African continent.  

From the emerging power house that is Machankura we sat down with Noelyne Sumba and Kgothatso Ngako – both brilliant innovators doing some powerlifting with bitcoin to serve the human rights of their fellow citizens and African neighbors. They translate bitcoin learning materials into native African languages, and found a way to own and store bitcoin, even if you don’t have an internet connection, or a smartphone, or even a crypto account – talk about innovation!!!! These young tech-guns are leading the way…. 

And, you would be hard pressed to find a more dedicated warrior in the fight for human rights than Meron Estefanos. Meron’s nickname is “The Huntress of Human Traffickers”, she brought fifteen human traffickers to justice, helped to save thousands of Eritreans from drowning in the Mediterranean and helped negotiate the release of hostages who were kidnapped and held at ransom. Forget Arnie and Stallone… Meron is the ULTIMATE badass. Manal sat down to speak with Meron about AI, human trafficking and so much more. 

Tune in for this absolutely unmissable episode from Season 3 of Tech4Evil. 

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In today’s digital age, our lives are intertwined with technology more than ever. From the moment we wake up to the minute we sleep, smartphones and smart devices have become our constant companions. But at what cost? Are we merely consumers in a digital marketplace, or is there a darker side to this tech-driven world?

In this special live episode of Tech 4Evil, recorded at the renowned South by Southwest (SXSW) festival in Sydney, hosts Manal Al-Sharif and Reinhardt Sosin take us on an eye-opening journey through the intricate web of technology that surrounds us. They discuss the paradox of technology and the impact on our fundamental human rights and privacy.

Episode Highlights:

Join the Conversation: Manal and Reinhardt not only present these thought-provoking topics but also invite the live audience to participate, sparking discussions around online security, privacy, and the broader societal impact of technology.

The Call to Action: As we navigate this tech-saturated world, it’s crucial to recognize our role and the power we hold. This episode of Tech 4Evil is more than just a conversation; it’s a call to action for listeners of all ages to join the movement in reclaiming our digital agency and ensuring technology remains a force for good.

Don’t miss this crucial episode that challenges us to rethink our relationship with technology, for our present and our collective digital future.

Recorded on : 20 Oct 2023 14:00 – 15:00 | ICC Sydney, Convention Centre, Sydney, 2000

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In a world where technology is synonymous with convenience, accessibility, and connectivity, it’s easy to take our digital liberties for granted. However, for those trapped in closed societies like North Korea, access to information is a rare and precious commodity. In this episode of ‘Tech for Evil,’ we delve into the intersection of technology and human rights, shedding light on the remarkable initiative known as ‘Flash Drives for Freedom‘ and its mission to empower North Korean citizens with information and foster dissent in North Korea.

“Flash Drives for Freedom” is a beacon of hope in this information-starved landscape. The program collects donated USB drives and SD cards, filling them with valuable information like Korean Wikipedia, documentaries, and real-world knowledge. These small devices are then smuggled into North Korea, giving North Koreans a glimpse of the truth beyond their borders.

Join us as we delve into the importance of this initiative and the transformative power of information. Discover how these efforts are gradually opening windows to the outside world for North Koreans and challenging the regime’s control. Learn how you can support “Flash Drives for Freedom” by Human Rights Foundation and be part of a movement that believes in the potential of information to inspire change and promote freedom.

Don’t miss this eye-opening episode, where we uncover the profound impact of technology used for a noble cause—to unlock minds and empower those living in one of the world’s most closed societies.

#EthiTech #HumanRights #Digital Rights #Surveillance #Democracy #Freedom #Dictators #DigitalActivism #DigitalTyranny #TyrannyofTech #NorthKorea #FlashDrivesForFreedom #HRF #HumanRightsFoundation

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Digital Battlegrounds: Bytes, Bravery, and the Pursuit of Freedom

The digital era – a double-edged sword, wielded by both heroes and tyrants. Welcome to an electrifying season, where the stakes are high, and the warriors are relentless.

“Dictatorship in the Digital Space” is an unsettling reality. As dictators exploit cutting-edge tech to muzzle dissent, monitor every move, and craft illusions of popularity, a valiant counterforce rises.

Join Manal and Reinhardt from the Tech4Evil podcast on season 3 titled “Don’t Click Here”. We dive into the riveting stories of intrepid activists, journalists, and freedom fighters from around the globe. Witness how, with wit and grit, they evade censorship, debunk disinformation, and guard civil liberties.

From ingenious tactics that keep communication lines open during internet blackouts, to subverting digital surveillance with counter-tech, this episode illuminates the indomitable human spirit.

But it’s more than stories; it’s an awakening. Through insights into the global struggle between liberty and oppression, democracy and dictatorship, you’ll grasp the vital role technology plays in shaping our shared future.

The digital reckoning is upon us. Will you join the ranks of the guardians of freedom? Empower yourself and your community by learning how to be a force for good in the digital age.

#HumanRights #Digital Rights #Surveillance #Democracy #Freedom #Dictators #DigitalActivism #DigitalTyranny #TyrannyofTech.

For many of us on this planet, our modern, digital lives are fast, cheap, convenient and smart as hell! Rediculously smart! Benign household devices like fridges and hoovers may have been born innocent and practical but have matured into obnoxiously in-your-face adolescent terrors. Devices that were once dumb are now terrifyingly capable and ”here to help” us. But have they gotten too smart? From voice assistants that can order groceries to smart thermostats that know when we’re home, our lives are becoming increasingly intertwined with technology. But what about the risks that come with this level of integration? Are these devices collecting our data without our knowledge or informed consent?

In this episode of Tech for Evil, we examine the dark side of smart devices and the potential threats they pose to our privacy and security. We’ll explore how these devices gather data about our habits, preferences, and even our conversations, all in the name of convenience. We’ll also discuss the ways in which this data can be used to target us with advertising, manipulate our behavior, or even be sold to third parties without our consent.

Join us as we dive into the world of smart devices and explore the tradeoffs we make for the convenience they offer. Are we sacrificing too much of our privacy and security for the sake of a more connected life? And what can we do to protect ourselves in an increasingly digital world? Don’t miss this important episode and join the growing movement that is fighting to keep tech good for all of us.

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Dating apps have radically reshaped the modern romance landscape. How we present ourselves and find other people on the dating market is now filtered through a digital lens. Dating Apps have turned the art of finding a partner into an online shopping experience very different from the raw, face-to-face courtship the previous generation had.

But what about the companies that make dating apps? How do the apps work? What is the science behind them? Are the dating apps really trying to find us our soul mate or is there something more sinister going on?

In this Episode of Tech4Evil Manal and Reinhardt examine the rise of dating apps, their origin story and the science that keeps us swiping obsessively. We also look at how these apps might take very personal information like our salary, religion and sexual orientation and send it on to third parties you never knew about. And what about the terrifying new things dating apps have brought us like addictive behaviors, harassment, deception, exploitation and even a rise in sexual assault? Is the price we’re paying to find our match too high?

Join Manal and Reinhardt as we explore the world of dating apps, find out what YouTube has to do with dating apps, how much money we spend on these apps annually and how they might make our love lives sick. Don’t miss this important episode and join the growing movement that is taking back our digital agency and fighting to keep tech good! For young and old and for our collective digital future.

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Have you ever found yourself wondering “…what if I just delete my Facebook account…?”

Believe us, you’re not the only one to have pondered this question jokingly or even seriously in the last few years, and with good reason. Some part of you likely came to this realisation, intuitively, that feeling insecure and sad and lonely after several hours of doom scrolling and checking all your social media accounts was not quite the experience you were promised from these Social Media Apps.

In this Episode of Tech4Evil Manal and Reinhardt take a close look at Jaron Lanier’s book Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now. For those of you who have seen the Netflix documentary The Social Dilemma, Jaron Lanier and his book are already permeating your consciousness.

The ideas put forward in the book are likely starting to tickle that part of your brain entertaining the notion that purging your toxic, pervasive and attention-stealing social media accounts could mean getting your life back. In other words, if you delete your Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Twitter accounts you might be able to have better mental and emotional health, be a better person and enjoy a more authentic human connection with your family and friends and loved ones. yes, you might get back to the life you had before all the notifications, posts, likes, comments and reshares started to chime and vibrate and ding their way into your daily consciousness through the smartphone you keep within reach 24 hours daily.

If you’re looking to follow that intuitive part of your brain down the rabbit hole and say “goodbye” to all this digital detritus from your life then this is the episode for you.

According to Jaron Lanier, when you delete your social media accounts you will join the resistance against the main insanity of our times, be less of an asshole, support the discovery of truth, be more empathetic and restore your economic dignity… Wow! What do you have to lose?

Join Manal and Reinhardt and explore some of the best reasons to get rid of all your toxic social media accounts. We will explain how Big Tech is doing its best to take up all our attention, all our emotional bandwidth and all our digital capital as netizens. Tune in to our Crash Course in Digital Self-Defense and spread the word about reclaiming our autonomy and digital agency. Don’t miss this important episode and don’t succumb to the hypnosis that Big Tech wants to permeate. We are taking back our digital agency and fighting to keep tech good! For young and old and for our collective future.

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Our guest for this episode is Andrew McAlister, a Data Ethics & Privacy Expert.

Today, Australia stands out as the only democracy to use facial recognition technology to enforce COVID-19 restrictions. The private sector is participating too. Last year, 7-Eleven in Australia collected the facial prints of 1.6 million customers without their knowledge or consent. 7-Eleven was never fined. And now OAIC is opening a probe into Bunnings and Kmart over facial recognition. Privacy advocates say there isn’t much hope looking at the 7-Eleven example. 

Facial recognition technology violates a fundamental human right, the right to privacy. And with facial recognition becoming increasingly sophisticated, it will soon be possible to monitor an entire population with minimal effort. But to what end?

Our guest for this episode is Andrew McAlister, a Data Ethics and Privacy expert, who will help us dig deeper into the state of facial recognition in Australia and explain what the rest of the free world is doing.

We talk about how facial recognition is now used as part of the psychological warfare in Ukraine, how Westfield tracks our every move once we step into one of their malls, and how Telstra’s tools can turn you into a green blob once passed by CCTV. We also talk about the US and EU and how their citizens resisted the use of facial recognition, and finally, we talk about Data for Good and how data can be used to save lives.

00:00:00 Why the Ivy didn’t let me enter their venue (Manal’s story)

00:03:40 OAIC opens probe into Bunnings and Kmart use of facial recognition

00:08:00 What’s biometric data and what’s facial print?

00:10:00 What’s the impact on customers in Australia where facial recognition is not regulated?

00:13:00 What does the Privacy Act say about the justifications for monitoring customers?

00:13:30 What is the second (or secondery) use of data?

00:15:14 What is Mesh technology and how does it monitor all our activities and behaviors in the real world? (scary shit!)

00:16:40 How our behavioral data is being monitized 

00:17:00 Deep facial analytics is the next step

00:18:30 What are the things supermarkets collect about us?

00:19:00 How Westfield track all shoppers activities once they step in

00:20:00 The arm race for collecting and exploiting behavior data in the physical world too

00:21:30 How ClearView is used in the Ukrainian war to identify dead Russian soldiers

00:24:40 Australia is the only democracy in the world to use facial recognition to enforce COVID-19 restrictions

00:25:27 The US federal law banning private facial recognition

00:26:00 The state of facial recognition law in Australia

00:29:00 Is Australia moving towards a technocracy?

00:33:00 Amazon Ring the largest crowdfunded mass surveillance project in the world

00:35:00 Data sharing agreements

00:37:40 What Europe is doing and how Australia can learn from that

00:42:00 Ethics in Technology and why businesses should care about them

00:46:00 Canada and facial recognition 

00:50:00  Data for Good and how it can save lives such as funding cancer research

00:54:00 Dr Gareth Williams and his startup CleanSense and how to use data for good

00:57:00 How to turn into a green blob when passing by CCTV?

00:58:00 Zero point privacy

01:02:00 Andrew McAlister message to technologists and regulators

Join the resistance against the excesses of Big Tech. We are taking back our digital agency and fighting to keep tech good! For young and old and for our collective future.

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Special thanks to Prof. Debbie Haski-Leventhal and Cameron Bogatez for sharing their experience with addictive technology for this episode.

In the third and final installment of the Captology mini-series, Manal and Reinhardt examine the profound and terrifying impacts that have come from Big Tech using Capatology tactics on children, parents and the average person.

In part three of our Captology series, we look at the phenomena of online social contagion and mental disorders among adolescent girls being traced back to social media. We also hear directly from a parent trying desperately to help their child through technology addiction and a young entrepreneur who may have the answer.

The rising attention economy created by Big Tech is robbing us of our ability to focus preventing us from connecting deeply with people around us and is polarising our society. The crazy thing is that the people who are behind it are aware of what they have done and some have turned their backs on their creations and are speaking out. 

If you’d like to know what the signs of social media addiction are in yourself and your children then tune in. Don’t feel too bad if you are a parent with a tech-addicted child, Big Tech is aggressively targeting their young minds throughout the day, but you can fight back. Join us for a surprising and uplifting crash course in digital self-defense and a very special guest in the studio.

Join the resistance against the excesses of Big Tech. We are taking back our digital agency and fighting to keep tech good! For young and old and for our collective future.

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In our second installment of the Captology mini-series Manal and Reinhardt drill down into several of the specific tactics and techniques that technologists use to hold us captive.

We look at how the Like and Share buttons were not just quaint additions to the social media landscape but rather, very deliberate and slick missiles that targeted our human desire for social affirmation. We explain what B.F. Skinner’s experiments with mice in the 50’s have to do with modern social media platforms. And we explore the ways that our natural human vulnerabilities can be exploited by Big Tech to get as much of our attention as they can and the catastrophic damage it has left in its wake.

Join Manal and Reinhardt for our second episode of Season 2 of Tech4Evil.com and join the resistance against the excesses of Big Tech. Tune in to our podcast for Crash Courses in Digital Self Defense and spread the word. We are taking back our digital agency and fighting to keep tech good! For young and old and for our collective future.

Special thanks to Cameron Bogatez, founder of fastasarocket.com the new ethical social media that helps you focus.