Author Archives: Tessa Zavala

New York is prohibiting smart glasses and other recording technology in courthouses. The policy supporting these rules includes preventing secret recordings of court proceedings in violation of state law and court regulations. Wisconsin & Pennsylvania have also banned smart glasses from court rooms. Government Technology

This week Fort Worth zoning commission heard public testimony on zoning limits for data centers. City Council will vote on data center limitations in August. Proposed limitations for data centers include: Minimum 250-foot setbacks from residential districts; Landscaping and screening requirements for facilities next to residential neighborhoods; Banning standby generators within 300 feet of homes […]

“Orbital, a new firm that emerged in May from a16z’s startup accelerator program Speedrun with a $5 million seed round, is the latest company promising to do inference in space — just as soon as Starship is flying regularly.” Tech Crunch

Daviess County enacted a one year moratorium on data center developments after concerns about transparency and land deals by unknown data center entities. Boyd County officials got an earful from residents over NDAs with what residents believe to be data centers. A bill in the state legislature that would have ensured electric rates did not […]

There’s a draft of a 3 year federal AI preemption over state AI laws is circulating. The legislation is named The Great American Artificial Intelligence Act of 2026. The bipartisan bill would codify AI Safety standards established under the Biden Administration. The 4 pillars of AI safety: establishing frontier artificial intelligence model governance, collecting insight into […]

AI is bringing with it an increase in “Synthetic identity fraud”.   What is synthetic identity fraud? It is fraud committed with fake identities using a mix of real and fabricated data.  Financial losses tied to synthetic identity fraud are expected to reach $3.1 billion in 2026. This is up from $1.8 billion in 2020. […]

Meet Texas Connects. “Texas Connects is a nonprofit organization representing a broad coalition of stakeholders who support the essential infrastructure data centers provide in our daily lives and modern 21st-century economy.”

RSI, recursion self improvement, means “an AI system that can continuously upgrade itself. Once AI systems can manage the upgrade cycle better than humans, the process can become a closed loop, limited only by the compute power they can access, and humans are no longer necessary or even helpful. ” We’re not at a place where […]

“In a letter shared by Sen. Ron Wyden with TechCrunch, U.S. Central Command said it was aware of hostile actors using purchased location data to track U.S. servicemembers.” The FBI is suggesting that people use ad blockers to minimize available data. What does this mean? Location data tracking is heading toward legislative and regulatory limitations. Tech Crunch

Illinois is the first state to require safety audits for AI. The bill would apply to “large AI developers — those with more than $500 million in annual gross revenue — to publish explanations of how their products could pose a “catastrophic risk” and how those risks would be addressed. The requirements would take effect […]