Late last month, the Boston Globe published a blockbuster scoop revealing the existence of "Quiet Skies," a secret TSA program that sent Air Marshals out to shadow travelers who were not on any watchlist and had committed to crime, on flimsy pretenses like "This person once visited Turkey." Read the rest

It's been six years since investigative journalists published their expose accusing London's Metropolitan Police of colluding with the UK's construction cartel to blacklist workers who complained about unsafe working conditions, abusive bosses and wage-theft, as well as union organisers and other "troublemakers" -- this week, the Met confirmed that its officers were an active part of the illegal blacklist. Read the rest

The fire in Grenfell Tower had many causes: Tory MPs protecting their rental incomes by voting down basic tenant safety; the Conservative Party's campaign against "safety culture"; but much of the blood is on the hands of Rydon, the contractor who sheathed the tower in the highly flammable cladding -- and came out on top, winning the contract to undo their work on other towers that had been similarly clad. Read the rest

Flexispy is the creepy stalkerware advertised to abusive spouses and exes that Motherboard's Joseph Cox has been relentlessly tracking; when he acquired a leaked trove of the company's files, he started to mine it to see who was buying the potentially illegal app. Read the rest

Detectives Marcus Taylor and Daniel Hersl of Baltimore's elite, seven-member Gun Trace Task Force are on trial for years of robbery, home invasions, drug dealing, gun dealing, and worse -- their defense is that they were not the primary participants in these activities, not that the crimes did not take place. Read the rest

Mick Mulvaney, the former loan-shark lobbyist who killed plans to regulate payday lenders after being appointed chief of the Consumer Finance Protection Board, has effective abandoned the agency's efforts to punish Equifax for leaking the sensitive personal and financial information of at least 145,500,000 Americans. Read the rest

If you're lucky enough to be friends with a cop, they may give you one of their get out of jail cards, which you can flash to other cops along with a request for favorable treatment. Read the rest

The Trump Administration just published a small notice in the Federal Register announcing that it would waive the outstanding criminal sanctions against some of the world's largest banks, Citigroup, JPMorgan, Barclays, UBS and Deutsche Bank. Read the rest

Five months after learning of the devastating Spectre and Meltdown bugs, Intel CEO Brian Krzanich sold off more than $39,000,000 worth of his Intel stock, all he was permitted to liquidate. Read the rest

More than a dozen major US airports are now covered in facial-recognition cameras, installed by the DHS to scan people departing on international flights without the legally mandated federal review process. Read the rest

A study published this year traces policing outcomes in Las Vegas between Sept 2014 and Oct 2015, comparing the conduct of 200 officers who wore bodycams and 200 who did not. Read the rest

As a Royal Commission in Australia wraps up its investigation into decades of rape by priests (especially rape of children), and decades of Church officials obstructing investigation into the rape, Melbourne Archbishop Denis Hart says he'll ask the Pope to change the rules so that celibacy for priests is voluntary, not mandatory. Read the rest

Chicago boasts one of the nation's most corrupt police forces: Chicago PD ran an off-the-books secret torture site; stole millions from innocents and used the funds to buy illegal surveillance gear; has more than 125,000 outstanding abuse complaints; conducted an illegal extortion racket and a coverup that went to the highest levels; is systemically racist and corrupt; a force that tolerates cops who cover up and celebrate murder (no surprise that the force trained the ex-Gitmo torturer who beat Dr David Dao unconscious for refusing to give up his seat on a United flight). Read the rest

Leo Lech is suing the police in Greenwood, Colorado for storming his house with a 50-person SWAT team because they mistakenly believed that a man who ran into his house (whom Lech didn't know) had shoplifted a shirt and two belts from Walmart; the police engaged in a 19-hour standoff that led to the near-total destruction of Lech's house due to the use of "calculated destruction," a tactic through which explosives are detonated through the house, room by room, to isolate the suspect. Read the rest

The project of making planes secure from terrorist attacks is an inescapable nonsense: nonsense because there's no way to screen millions of people to prevent a few dedicated ones from bringing down a plane (no, really); inescapable because no lawmaker or policymaker will ever have the courage to remove a measure that has previously been described as "essential for fighting terrorism" even if it was only ever security theater intended to assuage low-information voters. Read the rest

After a man called Connor Zion experienced several seizures, he became disoriented and attacked some of his family members, who called the police. Orange County, California Deputy Michael Higgins arrived, shot Zion nine times, approached Zion's motionless body, fired nine more shots into him at point-blank range, then, after a running start, stomped on Zion's head three times. Read the rest

Senators Bob Corker, Jeff Flake and John McCain talk a big game about not letting the GOP be the handmaiden of trumpist corruption, but when the chips were down last night, they voted with their party and a tie-breaking vote from Vice President Handmaid's Tale to pass legislation that lets financial institutions take away your right to sue them when they defraud you. Read the rest