Censorship News Articles

Ethan Zuckerman, a longtime technologist and social media scholar, thought he fully understood Section 230, the 1996 statute that contains the famous “26 words that created the internet.” But three years ago, he was reading its full text aloud to his class at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst when suddenly, in his words, “a lightbulb went off in my head.” It struck him that the law, widely understood to shield tech companies from being sued for their users’ posts, also protects users. In particular, it protects people who build tools to filter or moderate online content. People like Zuckerman’s friend Louis Barclay, a developer who in 2021 was permanently banned from Facebook and Instagram for developing a tool called “Unfollow Everything” that lets users, well, unfollow everything and restart their feeds fresh. Three years later, that eureka moment has turned into a lawsuit — one that, if successful, could loosen Big Tech’s grip on how people use social media. The suit ... asks a California court to declare that Meta can’t ban or sue him for building an unfollowing tool inspired by Barclay’s. If the suit succeeds, Zuckerman plans to release the tool, called “Unfollow Everything 2.0,” and hopes a wave of other tools to give users more control over their online lives will follow. Such tools are sometimes called “middleware” and have been touted by the Stanford political scientist Francis Fukuyama as a way to break Silicon Valley’s chokehold on online speech.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on censorship and corporate corruption from reliable major media sources.

The CIA is so known for its unabashed secrecy that, when it joined Twitter in 2014, its first tweet was: “We can neither confirm nor deny that this is our first tweet.” This non-response response is known as a “Glomar,” and while the intelligence community likes to poke fun at how often they invoke it, this inane phrase has allowed the CIA to skirt meaningful transparency and accountability for decades. In the post-9/11 era, we’ve repeatedly seen the CIA use the Glomar response to evade responsibility. We’re even seeing state agencies attempt to use the CIA’s non-response to circumvent local public records requests. For example, in 2017, the New York Civil Liberties Union filed a public records request seeking documents regarding the NYPD’s monitoring of protesters’ social media activity. The NYPD initially responded with a blanket statement that it could “neither confirm nor deny” whether such records existed, saying that even revealing the existence of records could harm national security. A New York court rejected this argument. And the CIA’s penchant for secrecy continues to expand, with the agency using Glomar to obstruct attempts to obtain records that would publicly shine a light on the agency’s failures and abuse, even when that abuse is well documented. Take, for instance, the CIA’s torture program. Public evidence ... has left no doubt of CIA involvement. And yet, the CIA continues to avoid its legal obligations under FOIA through gaslighting and Glomar.

Note: Learn more about the CIA’s longstanding propaganda network in our comprehensive Military-Intelligence Corruption Information Center. For more, read our concise summaries of news articles on intelligence agency corruption.

Last month, I revealed internal Twitter and Department of Homeland Security emails showing that the agency had successfully pressured the social media platform to censor the New York Times during the 2020 presidential election. It was impossible to get the Times to comment on my reporting that revealed that a government agency, enacted to protect national security, had muzzled one of its own. The paper remained silent. That was the case until last week when the Times finally mentioned the issue. In a lengthy article that falsely paints efforts to promote free speech as orchestrated entirely by Trump supporters, the Times buried an acknowledgment of our reporting some 52 paragraphs down. The backhanded way in which the Times finally noted that the government had suppressed the speech — in an article that essentially argues that free speech is a dangerous right-wing plot — reflects the institution's changing nature. Many in the public may view the paper as a beacon of the free press. After all, the most important Supreme Court case enshrining media rights was New York Times v. U.S., the 1971 case that made it clear that journalists have the right to publish even classified documents. There are sprawling constitutional issues at heart here that should go beyond left and right. This government or the next administration may use the DHS apparatus to control what is said about almost any political issue. DHS bureaucrats ... have planned to suppress “misinformation” about the Ukraine war, the origins of COVID-19, and topics as broad as “racial justice.” That power can easily be exploited. Last month, I testified before Congress on the importance of free speech. I also filed an amicus brief to the Supreme Court ... urging the justices to consider the lengthy evidence that the government has already overstepped its authority with respect to online censorship.

Note: This Substack was written by independent journalist Lee Fang. Read more about Department of Homeland Security's censorship efforts, including offensive operations to manipulate public opinion, discredit individuals, and infiltrate online groups. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of important news articles on censorship and media manipulation from reliable sources.

In his annual Festivus report—named after the fictional Seinfeld holiday—Senator Rand Paul tallies up some of the most egregious examples of government waste from the year. In all, Paul identified $900 billion in government waste from 2023. The national debt continues to skyrocket. One of the many problems with carrying such a heavy debt burden is the sheer volume of money that needs to be spent on interest. The U.S. Department of the Treasury spent $659 billion(!) in Fiscal Year 2023 just on interest payments. The Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has been pursuing some ... creative training programs. In a federally funded workshop last year, CISA employees focused on “effective strategies to build and sustain psychological safety that allows individuals to show up to work as their authentic and best selves.” “Ironically, the workshop coincided with CISA’s efforts to suppress protected speech on social media platforms,” Paul notes. “Even I was censored at the behest of our government speech minders. And all while I thought I was being my best self.” In addition ... CISA has been hard at work creating not one, but two graphic novels about “disinformation” as part of their “Resilience Series.” The first one covers foreign interference in elections. The second covers COVID vaccines. “There is nothing comical about wasting taxpayer money to justify censorship of constitutionally protected speech,” Paul notes in his report.

Note: Read more about CISA's role in manipulating and controlling public discourse. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and censorship from reliable major media sources.

The so-called Twitter Files, released ... by the independent journalist Matt Taibbi, set off a firestorm among pundits, media ethicists and lawmakers in both parties. It also offered a window into the fractured modern landscape of news, where a story’s reception is often shaped by readers’ assumptions about the motivations of both reporters and subjects. Mr. Musk teased the release of internal documents that he said would reveal the story behind Twitter’s 2020 decision to restrict posts linking to a report in the New York Post about Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s son, Hunter. Mr. Musk, who has accused tech companies of censorship ... pointed readers to the account of Mr. Taibbi, an iconoclast journalist. Published in the form of a lengthy Twitter thread, Mr. Taibbi’s report included images of email exchanges among Twitter officials deliberating how to handle dissemination of the Post story on their platform. Skeptics of Mr. Taibbi seized on what appeared to be an orchestrated disclosure. “Imagine volunteering to do online PR work for the world’s richest man on a Friday night, in service of nakedly and cynically right-wing narratives, and then pretending you’re speaking truth to power,” the MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan wrote in a Twitter post. Mr. Taibbi clapped back on Saturday, writing: “Looking forward to going through all the tweets complaining about ‘PR for the richest man on earth,’ and seeing how many of them have run stories for anonymous sources at the FBI, CIA, the Pentagon, White House, etc.”

Note: Matt Taibbi is one of the few journalists who reports it as he sees it and is willing to look far beneath the surface. We subscribe to his excellent reports as one very useful source of unraveling the jumble of news that comes our way. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on media manipulation from reliable sources.

Trump loyalist and CIA contractor Larry Ellison’s purchase of CNN appears imminent, and marks the latest venture into media for the world’s second-richest individual. The world’s seven richest individuals are all now powerful media barons, controlling what the world sees, reads, and hears, marking a new chapter in oligarchical control over society and striking another blow at a free, independent press and diversity of opinion. In September, President Trump signed an executive order approving a proposal to force through the sale of social media platform TikTok to an American consortium led by Ellison-owned tech company, Oracle. Under the planned arrangement, Oracle will oversee the platform’s security and operations, giving the world’s second-richest man effective control over the platform that more than 60% of Americans under thirty years of age use for news and entertainment. No other period in history has seen such a rapid and overwhelming buy up of our means of communications by the billionaire class – a fact that raises tough questions about freedom of speech and diversity of opinion. Today, the world’s seven richest individuals are all major media barons, giving them extraordinary control over our media and public square, allowing them to set agendas, and suppress forms of speech they do not approve of. This includes criticisms of them and their holdings, the economic system we live under, and the actions of ... governments.

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on financial inequality and media manipulation.

There’s a revolving door of talent between the country’s premiere intelligence agency and its entertainment industry, with inspiration and influence often working both ways. The agency is targeting professionals at the intersection of arts and technology for recruitment ... and continues to cooperate with entertainment giants to inspire the next generation of creative spies. Creative minds in Hollywood and the entertainment industry have long had a role at the Central Intelligence Agency, devising clever solutions to its most vexing problems, such as perfecting the art of disguise. In the 1950s, a magician from New York named John Mulholland was secretly contracted with the agency to write a manual for Cold War spies on trickery and deception. These days, the officers said, creative skills are more valuable than ever. “You’re only limited by your own imagination — don’t self-censor your ideas,” said Janelle, a CIA public affairs officer. “We’re always looking for partners.” Some of the CIA’s most iconic missions — at least the declassified ones — document the agency’s rich history with Hollywood, including Canadian Caper, when CIA operatives disguised themselves as a film crew to rescue six American diplomats in Tehran during the Iran hostage crisis, an operation moviegoers will recognize as the plot of “Argo.” CIA analysts have also been known to leave the agency for opportunities in the entertainment industry, writing books and scripts drawing from their experiences.

Note: Learn more about the CIA’s longstanding propaganda network in our comprehensive Military-Intelligence Corruption Information Center. The US Department of Defense has had a hand in more than 800 top Hollywood films. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on censorship and intelligence agency corruption.

On Tuesday, July 1, 2025, African Stream published its final video, a defiant farewell message. With that, the once-thriving pan-African media outlet confirmed it was shutting down for good. Not because it broke the law. Not because it spread disinformation or incited violence. But because it told the wrong story, one that challenged U.S. power in Africa and resonated too deeply with Black audiences around the world. In September, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken made the call and announced an all-out war against the organization, claiming, without evidence, that it was a Russian front group. Within hours, big social media platforms jumped into action. Google, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok all deleted African Stream’s accounts, while Twitter demonetized the organization. The company’s founder and CEO, Ahmed Kaballo ... told us that, with just one statement, Washington was able to destroy their entire operation, stating: “We are shutting down because the business has become untenable. After we got attacked by Antony Blinken, we really tried to continue, but without a platform on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and being demonetized on X, it just meant the ability to generate income became damn near impossible.” Washington both funds thousands of journalists around the planet to produce pro-U.S. propaganda, and, through its close connections to Silicon Valley, has the power to destroy those that do not toe the line.

Note: Learn more about the CIA’s longstanding propaganda network in our comprehensive Military-Intelligence Corruption Information Center. For more, read our concise summaries of news articles on censorship.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s February memo ordering all diversity, equity and inclusion-related content to be removed from Pentagon websites was so vague that military units were instructed to simply use keyword searches like “racism,” “ethnicity,” “history” and “first” when searching for articles and photos to remove. The implications of Hegseth’s memo were overwhelming, since the Defense Department manages over 1,000 public-facing websites and a huge visual media database known as DVIDS – with officials expected to purge everything relevant within two weeks. As a result, the manual work of individual units was supplemented with an algorithm that also used keywords to automate much of the purge, officials explained. Other keywords officials were instructed to search for included “firsts” in history, including content about the first female ranger and first Black commanding general, as well as the words “LGBTQ,” “historic,” “accessibility,” “opportunity,” “belonging,” “justice,” “privilege,” respect” and “values,” according to a list reviewed by CNN. The department is now scrambling to republish some of the content, officials said. “Of all the things they could be doing, the places they’re putting their focuses on first are really things that just don’t matter ... This was literally a waste of our time,” a defense official said. “This does absolutely nothing to make us stronger, more lethal, better prepared.”

Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on censorship and military corruption.

Careless People [is] a whistleblowing book by a former [Meta] senior employee, Sarah Wynn-Williams. In the 78-page document that Wynn-Williams filed to the SEC ... it was alleged that Meta had for years been making numerous efforts to get into the biggest market in the world. These efforts included: developing a censorship system for China in 2015 that would allow a “chief editor” to decide what content to remove, and the ability to shut down the entire site during “social unrest”; assembling a “China team” in 2014 for a project to develop China-compliant versions of Meta’s services; considering the weakening of privacy protections for Hong Kong users; building a specialised censorship system for China with automatic detection of restricted terms; and restricting the account of Guo Wengui, a Chinese government critic. In her time at Meta, Wynn-Williams observed many of these activities at close range. Clearly, nobody in Meta has heard of the Streisand effect, “an unintended consequence of attempts to hide, remove or censor information, where the effort instead increases public awareness of the information”. What strikes the reader is that Meta and its counterparts are merely the digital equivalents of the oil, mining and tobacco conglomerates of the analogue era.

Note: A former Meta insider revealed that the company’s policy on banning hate groups and terrorists was quietly reshaped under political pressure, with US government agencies influencing what speech is permitted on the platform. Watch our new video on the risks and promises of emerging technologies. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on censorship and Big Tech.

In yet another example of Donald Trump announcing new policy via social media, the president has now pledged to crack down on “illegal protests” at universities, warning that “agitators” will be headed to jail or targeted for deportation. On the campaign trail, Trump already pledged to crush pro-Palestinian protests if they ramp up again, including deporting foreign national students who participate. Peaceful protest isn’t illegal. But what many do not realize is that counterterrorism law gives enormously wide-ranging discretionary authority to the president, to law enforcement, and to immigration officials that could be used to squelch free speech and dissent. For example: providing material support for terrorism is a federal crime. The breathtaking scope of this provision becomes more clear once we see how the terms are defined. “Material support” includes the provision of “service,” “expert advice or assistance,” “communications equipment,” or “personnel” (including yourself). And the Supreme Court has confirmed that the support does not actually have to go toward any particular violent act that might be considered terrorism, only to a group that is designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) by the U.S. government, even if that support is otherwise lawful. Hamas is designated as an FTO and those opposing U.S. and Israeli policy are often accused of supporting Hamas. Could peaceful pro-Palestine protesters be charged with materially supporting terrorism?

Note: We have documented decades of free speech repression beginning with COINTELPRO. We support freedom for all peoples including Palestinians, and many of these campus protests have indeed been peaceful. However, we can in no way overlook the disturbing cases of campus protesters glorifying the violent attacks on October 7th and using Hamas symbols in banners and protest signs. Protesters have been caught on film screaming "We are Hamas." At NYU, a sign literally said "Death to Israel" and "Death to America." A University of Michigan pamphlet contained the phrase "Death to America." NBC News reported that the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network as a sham charity that allegedly funneled money to a pro-Hamas terrorist organization while also helping organize pro-Palestinian protests on US college campuses. Before October 7th, the human rights abuses and sexual violence Hamas committed against Palestinians were extensively documented. Where is the nuanced dialogue beyond media polarization on this tragic issue?

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit ... threw out the Federal Communication Commission’s Net Neutrality rules, rejecting the agency’s authority to protect broadband consumers and handing phone and cable companies a major victory. The FCC moved in April 2024 to restore Net Neutrality and the essential consumer protections that rest under Title II of the Communications Act, which had been gutted under the first Trump administration. This was an all-too-rare example in Washington of a government agency doing what it’s supposed to do: Listening to the public and taking their side against the powerful companies that for far too long have captured ... D.C. And the phone and cable industry did what they always do when the FCC does anything good: They sued to overturn the rules. The court ruled against the FCC and deemed internet access to be an “information service” largely free from FCC oversight. This court’s warped decision scraps the common-sense rules the FCC restored in April. The result is that throughout most of the country, the most essential communications service of this century will be operating without any real government oversight, with no one to step in when companies rip you off or slow down your service. This ruling is far out of step with the views of the American public, who overwhelmingly support real Net Neutrality. They’re tired of paying too much, and they hate being spied on.

Note: Read about the communities building their own internet networks in the face of net neutrality rollbacks. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on censorship and Big Tech.

Facebook’s inscrutable feed algorithm, which is supposed to calculate which content is most likely to appeal to me and then send it my way ... feels like an obstacle to how I’d like to connect with my friends. British software developer Louis Barclay developed a software ... known as an extension, which can be installed in a Chrome web browser. Christened Unfollow Everything, it would automate the process of unfollowing each of my 1,800 friends, a task that manually would take hours. The result is that I would be able to experience Facebook as it once was, when it contained profiles of my friends, but without the endless updates, photos, videos and the like that Facebook’s algorithm generates. If tools like Unfollow Everything were allowed to flourish, and we could have better control over what we see on social media, these tools might create a more civic-minded internet. Unfortunately, Mr. Barclay was forced by Facebook to remove the software. Large social media platforms appear to be increasingly resistant to third-party tools that give users more command over their experiences. After talking with Mr. Barclay, I decided to develop a new version of Unfollow Everything. I — and the lawyers at the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia — asked a federal court in California last week to rule on whether users should have a right to use tools like Unfollow Everything that give them increased power over how they use social networks, particularly over algorithms that have been engineered to keep users scrolling on their sites.

Note: The above was written by Ethan Zuckerman, associate professor of public policy and director of the UMass Initiative for Digital Public Infrastructure at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. For more along these lines, explore concise summaries of news articles on Big Tech from reliable major media sources.

It wasn’t so long ago that the traditional film and television business was thriving. The Big Six media conglomerates—General Electric, Time Warner, Sony, Disney, News Corporation, and Viacom—ruled the industry. But the double whammy of streaming and the pandemic toppled the old-media oligopoly. So most of the legacy media giants now are struggling simply to survive, while a new breed of digital-age behemoths, led by Amazon and Apple, gauge their film and television prospects, and Disney and Netflix lead the way into an uncharted online landscape. The failure of the conglomerates to adapt is none too surprising. Spurred by Reagan-era economic policies and the FCC’s deregulation campaign, the media industries converged in a series of M&A waves that began in the 1980s with the News Corp–Fox, Time-Warner, and Sony-Columbia mergers and culminated in the acquisition of Universal by GE, NBC’s owner, and the launch of NBC Universal in 2004. At that point, the Big Six owned all the major film studios, all the broadcast networks, and most of the top cable networks. They dominated other media industries as well, but their key assets were their film and television holdings. The Disney+ launch was a tipping point in the streaming era, prompting the ramp-up of Warner’s HBO Max, NBCU’s Peacock and ViacomCBS’s Paramount+. It also came just before the outbreak of Covid-19, which accelerated the global move to streaming.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on censorship and media corruption from reliable sources.

A group within the Department of Homeland Security that was set up to focus on combating disinformation has been put on pause, DHS said Wednesday, and its director Nina Jankowicz is stepping down. The decision ... comes in the midst of a coordinated ... campaign against Jankowicz. The group, called the Disinformation Governance Board, launched three weeks ago and has not met. The working group was created with the purpose of helping to develop strategies to combat disinformation while, DHS said, remaining committed to protecting Americans' freedom of speech and other rights. Republicans were quick to claim [that] the board would result in censorship, criticizing what they considered an unclear mission as well as Jankowicz as its leader. DHS says it is conducting a review and assessment on how to continue their work on combating disinformation which will last 75 days. During this time, they said the board will not operate. DHS initially decided they would shut down the board on Monday, but by Tuesday they decided the board's work would be paused. "It is deeply disappointing that mischaracterizations of the Board became a distraction from the Department's vital work, and indeed, along with recent events globally and nationally, embodies why it is necessary," Jankowicz said in a statement announcing her resignation.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and media manipulation from reliable sources.

The Department of Homeland Security's announcement of a "Disinformation Governance Board" to standardize the treatment of disinformation by the agencies it oversees has been met with an overwhelmingly negative response since it was first unveiled in April. "It's an awful idea, and you ought to disband it," Sen. Mitt Romney, Republican of Utah, told Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas at a Senate hearing. The new board is intended to standardize the department's efforts to respond to disinformation that could be connected with violent threats to the U.S. So, if an agency under DHS — like Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) or Cybersecurity and Information Security Agency (CISA) — identifies disinformation under its purview, it's the new disinformation board that would come up with the best practices for any DHS agency handling the disinformation. "There has been a lot of misinformation about your department's work to combat misinformation," said Senator Chris Murphy, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee's Homeland Security panel, told Mayorkas. "This is not the truth police," Mayorkas declared to the Senate panel ... responding to accusations of censorship. DHS selected author and disinformation expert Nina Jankowicz to lead the board. The former Fulbright-Clinton Public Policy Fellow previously oversaw programs for Russia and Belarus for the National Democratic Institute.

Note: 20 US Attorney Generals demanded DHS immediately disband this Disinformation Governance Board and “cease all efforts to police Americans’ protected speech.” For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption from reliable major media sources.

Guantnamo Diary ... in which Guantanamo detainee Mohamedou Ould Slahi tells of his odyssey through overseas prisons and his torture and abuse by the US and its counterterrorism allies, is pockmarked with redactions left by military censors. The diary was finally published last week. Slahi, a 44-year-old Mauritanian educated in Germany, was rendered by the CIA to prison in Jordan in late 2001, then held by the U.S. in Afghanistan and Guantanamo. The U.S. has never charged him with a crime. By the time the editor Larry Siems got hold of the manuscript in 2012, volumes of information about Slahis case had come into the public record. In 2006, the government released transcripts from hearings evaluating prisoners detention status, Slahis among them. Reports from the Justice Department and the Senate Armed Services Committee detailed his interrogation. Siems was able to cross-reference these materials to establish the chronology of Slahis narrative, in which all dates have been redacted. Journalists have not been allowed to speak directly to current detainees. For Larry Siems, censorship is at the core of Slahis story, and while the redactions sometimes impede his narrative, they serve a literary function as well. Secrecy was imposed in order for abuse to happen, and then more secrecy was imposed in order to cover it up, said Siems. The redactions are like the fingerprints of that longstanding censorship regime.

Note: Despite U.S. officials acknowledging that many Guantanamo detainees pose no real threat to society, prisoners like Slahi continue to be detained as part of the ineffective but profitable war on terror.

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