The Hound | Sept. 3

Hi there,

It’s Thursday. ICE has quietly contracted with ZeroFox — an AI firm with a documented history of labeling peaceful Black Lives Matter organizers as "threat actors" — to scrub agents' personal information from the internet. ICE employees who spoke anonymously were blunt: they worry the same technology will be turned inward to identify whistleblowers and critics within the agency itself.

🖊️ Sign the petition to call on the media to cover ICE's ZeroFox contract not as a routine cybersecurity procurement story, but as what it is: a federally funded operation to hide an already unaccountable agency from the public eye — and potentially silence the employees brave enough to report what they see from the inside.

That concern is not paranoid — it is well-founded. ZeroFox's own technology works by seeding information and monitoring who shares it. This is the same agency that has subpoenaed Reddit for the identity of a user who criticized ICE, that has tried to flip protesters into informants, and that operates primarily out of unmarked vehicles with masked agents. The public deserves reporting that asks who ICE is hiding from, and why.

In addition, a judge lit into RFK Jr.’s Department of Health and Human Services for using fake AI studies to justify the Trump administration’s decision to fund abstinence-only education programs. And, how journalists are building trust in marginalized communities.

Read about these, and more, with today’s stories:

ICE Is Paying a Controversial AI Firm to Hide the Identities of Agents (The Intercept)

Trump’s ridiculous bullying of Canada is backfiring (The Guardian)

Springfield's Haitian community braces for deportations after protected status ends (PBS)

Judge Tells RFK Jr. to Stop Using Fake AI Studies on Teen Pregnancy (The New Republic)

New Mail Voting Rules Moved Forward Despite USPS Officials’ Concerns About Mass Disenfranchisement (ProPublica)

How journalists are winning back the trust of marginalized communities (Good Good Good)

Until next time,

Harry from The Hound

P.S. Do you know someone who would appreciate The Hound? If you can, forward this email and encourage them to subscribe! Let’s stay informed, together.