Law enforcement is now monitoring for ‘anti-tech extremism’

Law enforcement agencies have started monitoring for what they’re calling “anti-tech violent extremism.” According to a new report released today, internal memos from the FBI, DHS, and local fusion centers make reference to purported dangers posed by growing opposition to the rapidly expanding AI sector and the data centers that power it, with at least one Regional Intelligence Center identifying activities like photographing a data center as suspicious activity that can identify “adversarial actors.”

The report, published today by Wired, is informed by a tranche of unpublished reports from law enforcement agencies. Reporter Daniel Boguslaw writes that anti-tech violent extremism seems to be a newly coined term, not referenced in any public-facing documentation from the FBI or DHS to date.

A New York Intelligence and Counterterrorism Bureau report referenced in the piece says that the “chaotic atmosphere” caused by rapid AI adoption “may fuel large-scale protests that devolve into civil unrest and anti-tech violent extremist activity.” Boguslaw writes that fusion centers like that New York bureau are now actively “gathering and circulating ‘intelligence’ about alleged threats to data centers.”

Documentation from the Northern Virginia Regional Intelligence Center reviewed by Wired lists activities like “observation” and “photography” of AI data centers as defined suspicious activity. “Suspicious activity reports are incredibly unreliable, often about vague or innocent behavior, issued under permissive standards,” NAACP Legal Defense Fund Senior Counsel Spencer Reynolds told the publication. “These reports, often received in large volumes, allow officers to inject their own biases and see what they want to see in the facts.”

Reynolds told the publication he worries that the nascent anti-tech extremism label could be applied so broadly as to include regular people who stand in lawful opposition to the AI industry. “As people continue to organize for a better future, we’re likely to see more surveillance and criminalization of this opposition,” Reynolds said.