The Lawfare Podcast

Content moderation in video games turns out to be just as much of a bummer as content moderation everywhere else, perhaps even more so. This week on Arbiters of Truth, our series on the online information ecosystem, Evelyn Douek and Quinta Jurecic spoke with Daniel Kelley, the director of strategy and operations for the Anti-Defamation League’s Center for Technology and Society. He studies how companies deal with the many moderation issues that pop up in gaming, from harassment to digital recreations of violent hate crimes and white nationalist propaganda. And his team at the Anti-Defamation League has a new report out on how players experience abuse—but also joy and connection—while gaming. Quinta and Evelyn asked Daniel to make the case for why everyone, gamers and non-gamers alike, should care about games, why harassment in gaming seems particularly bad compared to non-gaming platforms, and where the gaming industry stands when it comes to investing in content moderation.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The “going dark” debate, which concerns how society and the technology industry should address the challenges that law enforcement faces in investigating crime due to the increasing use of encryption on mobile devices and by communication platforms and services, was in the news again because of Apple's recent proposal to engage in client-side scanning. Apple planned to scan iPhones for child sexual abuse material, or CSAM, before such images were uploaded to iCloud. Prior to Apple's announcement, however, a distinguished group of computer scientists and engineers were already working on a paper to explain the security and privacy risks of client-side scanning. The paper, which they have now released, is called “Bugs in our Pockets: The Risks of Client-Side Scanning.” To talk about this most recent development in the going dark debate, Stephanie Pell sat down with two of the paper’s authors: Susan Landau, Bridge Professor of Cybersecurity and Policy in The Fletcher School and at the School of Engineering, Department of Computer Science, at Tufts University; and Ross Anderson, professor of security engineering at the University of Cambridge and at the University of Edinburgh. They discussed some of the most significant privacy and security risks client-side scanning creates, why client-side scanning requires a different analysis from other aspects of the discussion about government access to encrypted data, and why the authors of the paper consider client-side scanning to be a dangerous technology.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jack Goldsmith sat down with John Mearsheimer, the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor in the Political Science department at the University of Chicago, to discuss his recent article in Foreign Affairs, called “The Inevitable Rivalry: America, China, and the Tragedy of Great-Power Politics.” In that essay, Mearsheimer argues that America's engagement with China following the Cold War, and its fostering of the rise of China's economic and thus military power, was the worst strategic blunder any country has made in recent history. They discussed why he thinks this, why he believes we currently are in a cold war with China that is more dangerous than the one with the Soviet Union, and what concretely the U.S. government should do now to check China's power. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The complicated relationship between Iraq and the United States is once again approaching a crossroads. Parliamentary elections held in Iraq last month promise a new government featuring a new cast of political forces with their own difficult histories with the United States. The United States, meanwhile, is approaching the self-imposed deadline by which it has promised to withdraw U.S. combat troops from the country, even as its diplomatic and military presences in the country have continued to come under attack by Iran-backed militias. To discuss these developments, Scott R. Anderson sat down on Lawfare Live with Ambassador Doug Silliman, who served as the U.S. ambassador to Iraq from 2016 to 2019 and was previously the deputy chief of mission and political counselor there. They talked about the Sadrist block that appears to have won the recent elections, what other challenges are facing the Iraqi state and what they all mean for the future of our bilateral relationship.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From June 7, 2012: We don't review our own books here on Lawfare—not even if we happen to be Lawfare's book review editor. But Benjamin Wittes sat down the other day with Ken Anderson to discuss his wonderful new book, Living With the UN: American Responsibilities and International Order. It's a terrific read, full of insights about the U.S.-U.N. relationship, the U.N. as an institution, and the international governance movement more broadly.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From June 14, 2014: At the 2014 Computers, Freedom and Privacy Conference, a panel of experts debated the pros and cons of adding outside lawyers to litigation before two tribunals at the heart of the NSA surveillance controversy: the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court ("FISC") and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review ("FISCR"). As is well known, proceedings at those courts generally are held in secret and ex parte, with only the government arguing its position. But, in the wake of the Snowden revelations, many have called for reform, and for greater participation by non-government attorneys.The group was comprised of panelists Marc Zwillinger, an attorney with experience in surveillance matters; Alex Abdo of the American Civil Liberties Union; and Amie Stepanovich, of Access. Lawfare's Steve Vladeck moderated the discussion, which closely examined the question of whether, and how, to add more adversarial process to FISC and FISCR proceedings.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Only twice in history have two women who served as CIA officers been elected to Congress. The first time was 2018, and the second was 2020—both of them featuring Abigail Spanberger and Elissa Slotkin. David Priess hosted an event for the Michael V. Hayden Center at George Mason University’s Schar School of Policy and Government, speaking with both of them about their careers, both in the intelligence community and in Congress. Abigail Spanberger represents Virginia's 7th congressional district and was a CIA operations officer from 2006 to 2014. Elissa Slotkin represents Michigan's 8th congressional district. She served as a CIA analyst, as well as a National Security Council staffer and Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs. They talked about joining CIA, their experiences there, leaving the intel world, how their CIA experiences help them as legislators, and a few pressing national security issues.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There’s been a lot of news recently about Facebook, and a lot of that news has focused on the frustration of employees assigned to the platform’s civic integrity team or other corners of the company focused on ensuring user trust and safety. If you read reporting on the documents leaked by Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen, you’ll see again and again how these Facebook employees raised concerns about the platform and proposed solutions only to be shot down by executives.That’s why it’s an interesting time to talk to two former Facebook employees who both worked on the platform’s civic integrity team. This week on Arbiters of Truth, our series on the online information ecosystem, Evelyn Douek and Quinta Jurecic spoke with Sahar Massachi and Jeff Allen, who recently unveiled a new project, the Integrity Institute, aimed at building better social media. The goal is to bring the expertise of current and former tech employees to inform the ongoing discussion around if and how to regulate big social media platforms. They dug into the details of what they feel the Institute can add to the conversation, the nitty-gritty of some of the proposals around transparency and algorithms that the Institute has already set out, and what the mood is among people who work in platform integrity right now. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Last week, Facebook unveiled its new corporate brand—Meta—and its corresponding vision for a new immersive world called the metaverse. The rebrand announcement attracted plenty of consternation from tech journalists, but there are also plenty of interesting issues about the metaverse itself. What type of content moderation problems does virtual reality pose? How might we think about the challenges of platform governance in this new age? What aspects of the metaverse are most worth paying attention to? Jacob Schulz sat down with Lawfare’s Alan Rozenshtein and Quinta Jurecic to talk it all through. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has issued a declassified assessment of the origins of the coronavirus, and it’s a bit of a muddle. Was it a lab leak? They don't really know. Was it naturally occurring? They're not quite sure. They do know a few things. It wasn't a bioweapon, and we're not going to find out any real answers until China starts cooperating. To chew over the ODNI’s report, Benjamin Wittes sat down with Shane Harris of the Washington Post, who wrote a story about the assessment last week. They talked about what the Intelligence Community could agree on, what it couldn't agree on, why the people with the minority opinion were more confident than the people with the majority opinion, and what we can and can't say about the coronavirus.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.