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Cynthia Khoo

@cyn-k.bsky.social
2.6K followers 967 following 1K posts

👩🏻‍💻 Tech & human rights lawyer @ tekhnoslaw.ca ⚖️ Senior Fellow @citizenlab.ca | fmr @cippic.bsky.social | fmr @georgetownprivacy.bsky.social 🎓 LLM @cdtsuottawaclts.bsky.social | JD @UVicLaw 🤸🏻‍♀️ Capoeirista

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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
I've listened to Vibe Check on/off for years, but have been bingeing their back catalog over the past 1-2 months as my go-to all-day listen, so am especially excited to see this. (Even if it does slightly defeat one of the reasons it became a go-to—"not [directly] work-related"—but besides that!)
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The Vertlartnic @thev.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Six Reasons Heart Disease Is Normal, Good For You, And Nothing To Do With That Covid Infection
A woman laughing and holding her chest

Headline:
Six Reasons Heart Disease Is Normal, Good For You, And Nothing To Do With That Covid Infection
Story by Melvin Ankelbeiter and Jeremy Poos

Photo from Adobe
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
One of the last things I did at @georgetownprivacy.bsky.social before returning to Canada was designing & securing research ethics approval for a new project: investigating worker surveillance & freedom of assembly/assocn issues at Whole Foods post-Amazonificatn. The team took it from there, & how!!
law.georgetown.edu
Whole Worker Surveillance
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Athena Coalition @athenaforall.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
"The AI revolution means nothing but loss for the average person if its benefits are concentrated among the already-wealthy." This is why we can't just stop at regulating data centers -- we need to overhaul the entire tech industry! www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
Labor unions must unite against AI datacenters | Tyler Turner
Workers should start with a moratorium against building until our livelihoods and communities are protected
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Athena Coalition @athenaforall.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Tech corporations want to squash AI data center opposition by suggesting community benefits agreements will solve the problem. Let’s break down why CBAs aren’t the solution 🧵 www.politico.com/news/2026/09...
politico.com
‘An imperfect solution’ gains traction in data center fight
Governors are turning to community benefit agreements as they scramble to address data center blowback without alienating tech giants.
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Lol forget regulation, they would be criminalized by the end of the week.
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
No one should be working or publicly opining on "~AI safety~" without first reading this paper by @kristenthomasen.bsky.social — asking whose safety is centred in these kinds of discussions and proposed responses, drawing on abolitionist scholarship:
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Shocked, shocked I tell you. 🤷🏻‍♀️
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Noura Aljizawi @noura.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
8/We also found a disturbing pattern of institutional neglect. Organizations often benefit from the labour of these activists, yet fail to provide necessary support (legal, psychological, professional, reputational) when they are targeted, as in Gülnar's experience.
Quote from Gülnar describing her experience with institutional abandonment.
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Noura Aljizawi @noura.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
4/Why focusing on queer women? And how is it different from the experiences of male activists? While threats overlap, gender and sexuality are weaponized as key factors in both shaping the attacks & impacts on exiled queer women dissidents. These nuances are invisible without an intersectional lens
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Noura Aljizawi @noura.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
2/This critical protection gap is the focus of our new paper "Security Without Safety: Queering Cybersecurity in the Age of Digital Transnational Repression," published in the Journal of Online Trust & Safety’s special issue on "Digital Intersectionality and Marginalisation in the Majority World."
Screenshot of the paper titled: "Security Without Safety: Queering Cybersecurity in the Age of Digital Transnational Repression" in the Journal of Online Trust and Safety's special issue on Digital Intersectionality and Marginalization in the Majority World
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Noura Aljizawi @noura.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
1/ Exile as "Safe haven" has become an illusion for women & queer activists. Crossing borders is no longer a guarantee of safety when repressive states use digital technology & weaponize intersectional identities to silence them & sabotage lives & rights in exile. Yet, they face such threats alone🧵
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Noura Aljizawi @noura.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
I’m thrilled to have our paper published in this fantastic JOTS’s special issue on Digital Intersectionality and Marginalization in the Majority World. Read more about our paper on “Queering Cybersecurity in the Age of Digital Transnational Repression” in this thread🧵 bsky.app/profile/nour...
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
If your concerns about women's health, reproductive or bodily autonomy, women's rights in general, or impacts on them from rightwingers, were downplayed at any time since 2016, you may be entitled to compensation. If the person downplaying was a cishet man, you may be eligible for punitive damages.
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jenna ruddock @ruddock.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
every piece of this story is a horror, except for Maddie and the people who love her being willing to speak out - risking new waves of harassment in the process - to protect future targets
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
"It’s a delicate time for Meta’s smart glasses." That wording does kind of land with the same effect as saying, "It's a delicate time for predatory behaviour." Good?? It should always be?? Not just "delicate" but an actively bad and hostile time???
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M a r c u s 🏳️‍🌈🇧🇧 @marcusjdl.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Finished with cultural appropriation? Time for the photo shoot in a field!!!
Jessie J, Justin Timberlake, Miley Cyrus, Ed Sheeran, all pictured in fields in a collage the tr t reads “Handy collage of pop stars pictured in fields after they've finished with Black music x”
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Tyler, from the Internet (Haunted) @tylerfromtheinternet.com · 14/09/2026
I fucking hate "I don't take sides" people, which is just siding with the oppressor and hoping you'll have plausible deniability. You're not apolitical, you're not neutral, you're just doing this:
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evacide @evacide.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Good news! You don't even need to be a cop in order to use Flock to stalk a domestic abuse survivor, you just need to be related to one. www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/arti...
sfchronicle.com
San Jose officer used Flock cameras to help relative track domestic violence victim, chief says
A San Jose police officer allegedly accessed the department’s license-plate tracking system to monitor a victim of alleged domestic abuse and give Flock Safety camera information to his relative.
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Leah McElrath @leahmcelrath.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Dolly Parton’s sister:
Stella Parton @StellaParton
X.com
I'm here to sound the alarm again today as l've been doing since 2016.
We are in a dire situation when a performer is pulled from a tour for simply calling out genocide in Gaza.
5:15 AM • 9/15/26 • 1.2M Views
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Anodyne @anodynesix.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
"The burden of data center growth is already falling heavily on Black communities. Data centers can drive demand for gas-fired power plants and turbines, which emit smog-forming nitrogen oxides, fine particulate matter and, in some cases, hazardous air pollutants ... connected to a slew of cancers."
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Wolfie Christl @wchr.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Proud I helped create the website for a 2002 Vienna conference where she discussed her stuff 🙃
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
This is repetitive by now but bears repeating until enough behaviour changes among enough powerful/privileged people to make a difference: It. was. NEVER. about. free. speech. And everyone who didn't benefit from racism, sexism, etc knew it all along, from the start, at all relevant fucking times.
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april @april-now.bsky.social · 22/09/2025
none of this is new! silicon valley has always been like this! read!!
some tech books on a bedspread

Race After Technology by Ruha Benjamin
Cyberlibertarianism by David Golumbia 
Surveillance Valley by Yasha Levine
To Save Everything Click Here by Evgeny Morozov
The Black Box Society by Frank Pasquale
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Gil Durán @gilduran.com · 09/09/2026
Paulina Borsook’s book launch is next week in Oakland. New “Cyberselfish” —with a foreword by me. This event will sell out. Buy tickets now! (See you there?) luma.com/05tl0orh
luma.com
An evening with Paulina Borsook about her classic book, Cyberselfish · Luma
Paulina Borsook's Cyberselfish, first published in the year 2000, was a groundbreaking exploration of the culture of Silicon Valley. The book saw the warning…
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I Scare You Like Sound Dog @chadstanton.blacksky.app · 16/09/2026
It’s bad that there hasn’t been any ability to maintain a cordon sanitaire around white nationalists from any wing of the political mainstream.
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Doctor Memory @blank.org · 16/09/2026
“Let’s assume there’s a 10% risk of an unaligned superintelligence causing—“ No, let’s not. We have no grounds on which to assign any probability to any portion of that scenario. Try again.
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Doctor Memory @blank.org · 16/09/2026
I believe it was @dsquareddigest.bsky.social who noted that the only way to survive an argument with Milton Friedman was that when he said “let us assume” to immediately interject “no, we will not assume that” and it’s an equally valid approach to discussing “AI risk”.
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ve, the ghost of info past @vortexegg.com · 16/09/2026
High-speed rail and translucent 90s gadgets are spiritual siblings in the good future we didn't go down.
A picture with a variety of computer, gaming, and media devices from the 90s that all have colorful translucent shells. The picture text reads "technology design peaked here".
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James Ball @jamesrball.com · 16/09/2026
I do think anyone who wants us to take Elizer Yudkowsky seriously as an authority on AI armageddon should be forced to testify on video that they have read the entirety of his 660,000 word rationalist Harry Potter fan fiction – written aged 30–34 – and still thinks the world needs his take.
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Liza Goitein @lizagoitein.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
On Sunday, the Trump administration missed a statutory deadline to declassify a FISA Court opinion from March that reportedly finds more Section 702 compliance issues affecting Americans’ rights. The administration is now in violation of the law. 1/18
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Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 16/09/2026
UK gets a new hyperlocal racism amplifier, courtesy of Amazon.
theguardian.com
Amazon to launch Ring ‘neighbourhood watch’ app in UK amid US privacy fears
Doorbell firm aims to replace WhatsApp or Facebook groups with platform where people can post about safety or lost pets
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Hasn't the weather been strange lately @thefallingdream.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
And that _is_ the problem. It's not that these ideas are bad, there's bad ideas everywhere, who give a fuck. It's that these bad ideas, and certain people who believe them, are being taken very seriously and handed lots of power over the rest of us. I hope it's clear why they should not. /END
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Hasn't the weather been strange lately @thefallingdream.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
However, if we don't live in a perfect meritocratic simulation that rewards the bestest specialest cleverest brain boys for loving computer the most, that would mean reality is complex and they don't understand or control it. /
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Micah @rincewind.run · 16/09/2026
"why does the left distrust AI" certainly has plenty to do with the technology itself but at its core I think it is about the fact that everyone building it is a wannabe fascist oligarch and nobody trusts them on a god damn thing
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Would love to see the Venn diagram of people who are upset about this but also oppose Bill C-22 on privacy grounds or don't think people should be allowed to (slash, think people should be, or that it's acceptable if they are, subjected to violence if they) record police or ICE agents.
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Derek Doom @thescratchmonkey.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
http://twitter.com/amyhoy/status/1602077621595971584

Amy Hoy (@amyhoy)

this is the best explanation of roko's basilisk ever written

likes 1799  retweets 444

null @nova@starflower.space

computer boys are realy like "imagine a boot so big that logically we must start licking it now in case it might possibly exist someday"

12/10/22, 1:50 PM
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Sable, Final Girl 🏳️‍⚧️ @ghostlysable.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
let me get this straight: a bunch of people who call themselves "rationalists" told themselves a ghost story about Mean Computer and then decided to create one that would only hurt other people, and as a result we got the return of fascism led by guys using a CSAM machine to create propaganda
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Tim “Positive Subway” Smith @positivesubway.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
It tells you all you need to know about the role of policing in general that the people who are constantly shrieking about low-level crime and homelessness and bike lanes (lol) as intolerable intrusions on our quality of life have no problem with this
Private cars completely blocking a public sidewalk near a Bronx station house, rendering it unusable
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Tim “Positive Subway” Smith @positivesubway.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
There is a connection between I can park wherever I want, we are an occupying army, and bashing a suspect’s brain to bits with a picnic cooler, or using departmental resources to track down and attempt to kill someone who you suspect of stealing your car. Why follow the rules?
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
"It has built-in privacy protections" — lol. Like what? Does it somehow magically sense when someone is being recorded without consent and automatically shut itself down until the user emails a signed written consent by the other would-be-recorded person(s) to the company??
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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
RT for KB's point, but unrelated: as someone who has spent a lot of time researching & STRESSED over what I should bill, what a fair/ reasonable rate is that does justice to my legal skills/expnc/expertise but is "accessible" (lol — relative to big law)... it's really truly just all made up, huh??
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Karl Bode @karlbode.com · 16/09/2026
it would take you literally like 20 minutes to get an eager economics or computing science academic on the phone to explain to you that this is all bullshit, but that would disrupt the interests and goals of extraction class paper ownership, so you get this weird ass journalistic simulacrum
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Karen K. Ho @karenho.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
I suspect the economics and business journalists who try to do what you describe either get shot down by editors, lose access to sources by PRs, or their stories get less page views and subscription conversions.
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Scary Mr. Olmec Man @scarymrolmecman.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
The Ms. Rachel thing is instructive because ppl just vaguely talk about her being antisemitic so as to avoid articulating her original offense: daring to feature in her videos a 3 year old whom the IDF blew the feet off of
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Ron Deibert @rondeibert.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
A troubling development reported by @josephcox.bsky.social about Tangles and Webloc and ICE 🇺🇸 In April 2026, @citizenlab.ca published an extensive overview "Uncovering Webloc", which detailed as much as we could uncover about the firm at the time citizenlab.ca/research/ana...
citizenlab.ca
Uncovering Webloc: An Analysis of Penlink’s Ad-Based Geolocation Surveillance Tech
Location data collected from mobile apps and digital advertising can reveal habits, interests and almost any other aspect of someone's life. In this report, we uncover how a geolocation surveillance s...
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Rebecca Tushnet @rtushnet.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
I think the fact that non-human posting is now, by some measures, dominant online changes how courts should think about these comments. It’s not a hearsay exception if there’s no state of mind one way or another
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Michael Harriot @michaelharriot.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Notice how those “apolitical” people ALWAYS end up siding with the oppressors
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Saeed Jones @theferocity.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
“But as Irish people we know all too well about genocide, forced famine and violent occupation. I cannot stand by and allow billionaires to use their position of power to silence the rightful voices of those who speak up against Israeli genocide…” — Aaron Rowe
theguardian.com
All supporting acts withdraw from Ed Sheeran’s tour in solidarity with Macklemore
Four openers and live band for Sheeran’s tour depart after removal of Macklemore over ‘free Palestine’ comments
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LorennaCleary.bsky.social @lorennacleary.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
They couldn’t handle even a moment of the sound a data center makes.
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