Our most impact yet

Hey there, Joseph here with an update on the impact that 404 Media has had recently. Frankly, this has been some of the most impactful few months of our outlet's entire run. I'll show you some examples, but to celebrate we're offering you the chance to subscribe to 404 Media with a 20% discount for the year. So instead of paying $100, you pay $80. We are a team of just four people, and we can't do this type of work without the support of our paying subscribers. Get that offer here and help us do more.

Check out what we've done recently:

• We revealed that ICE was tapping into Flock, a nationwide AI-enabled camera network, thanks to local cops. Since then, a police department shut off external access to its cameras after learning they were being searched for immigration related offenses and Austin banned Flock in its city and specifically cited our reporting. The company now says it has severed access to Illinois data for 47 agencies. Our reporting has also enabled a wave of local news outlets around the country to probe how their cities' police departments are using these cameras.
• We also revealed a Texas cop searched Flock cameras nationwide for a woman who had a self-administered abortion. In response to that, the Illinois Secretary of State is investigating the respective suburban Chicago police department because this data sharing violates state law. And the Secretary of State is creating an audit system to make sure police departments are following this law.
• Flock scrapped an idea to use hacked data in a controversial surveillance system that would let police jump from license plate reader to person, after we revealed the plans.

• Meta sued a nudify app that 404 Media reported bought thousands of ads on Instagram and Facebook, repeatedly violating its policies. Meta also announced it’s “strengthening” its enforcement against these nudify apps on its platform.
• We broke the news that TeleMessage, a Signal-clone used by the Trump administration, was hacked. Lawmakers demanded answers from the DOJ, and Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which used TeleMessage, paused its use of the tool. TeleMessage itself suspended operations too.
• Civitai, a site 404 Media has repeatedly shown was used to generate nonconsensual adult content, banned all AI models designed to generate the likeness of real people.
• After we found Meta's AI Studio chatbots were posing as therapists, even giving fake license numbers and credentials, four senators demanded answers from Meta and urged it to limit the "blatant deception" from its chatbots. A complaint from digital rights organizations to the FTC about these bots was also spurned by our reporting.
• We uncovered that 100,000 people were using a Telegram bot that made non-consensual AI sex videos of anyone. After we covered it, Telegram shutdown the bot.
• We found that Coca Cola was running an AI-powered ad that got basic facts wrong and fabricated quotes from authors. Coca Cola pulled down the ad in response.

Again to celebrate our latest impact, we're offering you an annual membership for $80. You can support this work and make sure we can do more. Plus, access all of our articles, get bonus podcast content every week, and watch livestreams and videos where we tell you how to pry records from the government.

Still not on board? Here is even more of our impact from earlier this year:

• A public library ebook service said it was going to cull AI slop after Emanuel found low quality books were flooding libraries.
• GeoSpy, an AI tool that let anyone geolocate photos in seconds and whose users could include stalkers, dramatically restricted access after Joseph published an investigation into it.
• Nvidia was sued after Sam revealed the company scraped YouTube and other sites en masse to build its own AI systems.
• Congress repeatedly grilled Apple and Meta over their association with nonconsensual nudify and deepfake apps after Emanuel exposed the connections. 
• Phone forensics company Cellebrite stopped service in Serbia following an Amnesty International research project and 404 Media's coverage of abuses in the country.

Thank you for supporting our mission. Really, this is just the start.

Sincerely,

404 Media (Joseph, Sam, Emanuel, and Jason)