Tech

US Courts To Begin Publishing Spyware Records From 2029

Published

1 day ago

August 17, 2026

The government’s spyware playbook has had one big problem for the public: there has been no reliable count of how often it is used.

That is set to change as U.S. federal courts prepare to track spyware and hacking-based communications interceptions in a new category of the annual Wiretap Report.

The development matters because spyware can put investigators much closer to the source of a person’s communications than conventional network interception can. Yet while the judiciary has published detailed statistics on court-authorized wiretaps for decades, those reports have not separately shown how many specifically involved government spyware techniques.

The figures to come will still leave some questions unanswered. But they will give lawmakers, researchers and the public something they have largely lacked: a number that can be tracked from one year to the next.

What the agreement introduces

According to TechCrunch, the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts will add a “spyware/hacking” category to the annual Wiretap Report. That will allow courts to separately count cases in which hacking techniques are authorized to intercept communications.

Spyware is a form of malware designed to secretly monitor or collect information from a device, and its capabilities can go far beyond simply reading messages.

Depending on the tool, it can give an attacker access to communications, files, location data, screenshots, and even a device’s camera or microphone. That makes spyware particularly powerful in the hands of threat actors.

The new report category, however, would not create a public record of individual spyware operations and will not necessarily capture every government use of hacking tools, such as a remote search for information already stored on a device. That leaves a significant portion of government hacking activity still outside the public view.

There are also timing and scope limits. The new category will start with 2028 data and will not disclose to the public how extensively government agencies have used spyware in previous years.

Privacy advocates welcome the change

Despite the apparent limitations, government surveillance and privacy advocates have lauded the effort.

In a statement to TechCrunch, Sen. Ron Wyden said he is “thankful that the federal courts agreed to collect and publish data about hacking.” Wyden also suggested that this is the starting point, citing the “Government Surveillance Transparency Act” he and others reintroduced earlier this year.

Eva Galperin, the director of cybersecurity at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, called the use of spyware surveillance a “problem,” while noting that the development will bring greater accountability on its use.

Brett Max Kaufman, senior counsel in the American Civil Liberties Union’s Center for Democracy, said it was a “long overdue” transparency step.

Why this development matters

The decision could give privacy advocates in other regions a stronger case for demanding similar transparency from their governments, particularly as spyware capabilities increasingly become advanced.

But transparency also has a security side: while these aggregate figures should not give hackers a playbook, the development would make government surveillance records — which are already highly targeted — even more valuable to threat actors.

For individuals, however, the more important consequence is what the data could eventually expose about the scale and reach of device surveillance — information that can be used to challenge excessive or unlawful monitoring and push for stronger safeguards.

The consequences of device surveillance can also extend beyond the person being targeted. Access to a compromised device may expose communications involving journalists’ sources, lawyers’ clients, colleagues, relatives and other contacts.

The value of the new reporting category is therefore less about revealing individual government operations and more about establishing a public baseline for how frequently one of the most intrusive forms of digital surveillance is being authorized.

Other News: The White House is pushing for greater scrutiny of AI model safety as the government weighs how advanced systems should be evaluated before deployment.

Tech

Cursor capitalizes on Github frustration, launches rival hosting platform

Published

9 minutes ago

August 18, 2026

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For as long as anyone can remember, Github has been the de facto code host preferred by a majority of developers. However, in recent times, the platform has struggled with widely reported outages and performance degradation and, as it drops the ball, Cursor is waiting to pick it up.

The AI startup, which is now officially a part of SpaceXAI, launched Origin this week — a new code hosting platform designed to do all of the things that developers typically use Github for: collaboratively work on codebases, browse and edit them, handle pull-requests (edits made by others asking to be added to the main codebase) and store them in repositories.

This seems like a natural next step for Cursor, whose primary focus up until this point has been selling automated web development services through its AI Code Editor. Cursor has also said that “agent native” features will soon be available for Origin, although hasn’t shared many details yet. The company also says it is building a wider “app ecosystem” to support broader coding efforts within Origin.

Interestingly enough, using Origin doesn’t require a user to stop using Github. Indeed, Origin is designed to allow developers to work alongside Github and pass code back and forth between the two in an interoperable manner.

“Your GitHub repos can sit alongside the ones Cursor hosts,” Cursor says in its blog. “Connect GitHub to Cursor, pick your org, and you’ll see the repos you can sync. Select one and Cursor pulls it in.”

The launch of Origin coincides with ongoing frustration over a perceived dip in Github’s services. Indeed, on the same day that Cursor launched its new platform, Github suffered a quite lengthy worldwide outage. For over six hours, the site’s functions were reportedly degraded, with a nearly 20 percent error rate worldwide.

This isn’t the first time in recent times when this has happened either. Earlier this year, after a rash of outages, Github announced new actions to sate unhappy coders as its availability problems seemed to escalate. More broadly, the platform has suffered 257 outages over the past year, a recent analysis by LeadDev states. Such persistent issues have led to “a visible exodus of high-profile users” writes LeadDev’s reporter Charles Humble.

Still, if Cursor wants to compete with Github, it will have its work cut out for it. According to Github’s own metrics, some 180 million developers use its platform as of last October. The platform, which was founded in 2007 and was acquired by Microsoft in 2012, continues to be the largest source code hosts in the world.

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Tech

DOJ’s probe into Andreessen Horowitz over board seats baffles VCs

Published

2 hours ago

August 18, 2026

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The Justice Department has launched a probe into Andreessen Horowitz regarding the firm’s partners serving on the boards of competing companies, Bloomberg reported.

The nearly year-long investigation focuses specifically on the firm’s board seats at Databricks, which is valued at $190 billion, and Fivetran, which combined with dbt Labs in June. The firm’s co-founder, Ben Horowitz, serves on the board of Databricks, while partner Martin Casado serves on the board of Fivetran.

Several VCs told TechCrunch they were surprised by news of the probe. Databricks and Fivetran are competitors now, but the two companies weren’t rivals when a16z invested in the startups, according to another Databricks investor who spoke on condition of anonymity. Databricks is largely known for its cloud storage products but, with its Lakeflow product, has expanded into AI data pipelines and application connectors. That’s Fivetran’s main business.

Given that Andreessen Horowitz has backed hundreds of companies, it’s almost inevitable that some startups will pivot or expand into the same markets, becoming competitors.

While backing direct rivals has become more acceptable recently, as evidenced by the many VCs that funded both Anthropic and OpenAI, holding a board seat on competing startups creates a far greater conflict of interest. Directors are generally privy to much more sensitive strategic information than non-board investors ever see.

Such conflicts can be resolved by having a partner step down from one of the boards. However, because Databricks and Fivetran have different individuals from the same VC firm on their boards, a16z can institute a so-called Chinese wall between Horowitz and Casado, which would prevent the two partners from sharing confidential information about the two companies with each other, one investor said.

The investigation invokes Section 8 of the Clayton Act, a 112-year-old law stating that an individual or entity is barred from serving on the boards of competing companies. Since regulators have rarely targeted venture capital with this rule, the industry is watching the DOJ’s probe closely. If a16z is forced to surrender a seat, founders may place less value on board commitments from top-tier VCs, given that those investors might be forced to step down if a portfolio overlap creates a future conflict.

a16z did not immediately respond to our request for comment, nor did it respond to Bloomberg. Databricks and DOJ declined comment.

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Tech

TikTok explores peer-to-peer payments via DMs, report says

Published

2 hours ago

August 18, 2026

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TikTok is developing a feature that would allow users to send each other money via direct messages, according to a new report from Bloomberg. If rolled out, the feature would use the social media service’s TikTok Pay offering, which is already available in Southeast Asia for TikTok Shop purchases.

References to the potential feature were found in code hidden within the current version of TikTok’s U.S. iPhone app, according to the report. The code indicates that recipients would be able to “tap to accept” payments, while senders could include messages with their payments, similar to Venmo.

TikTok told Bloomberg that the feature is not being tested, which suggests that it’s in early development. Given that the feature is still under development, it’s unknown when or if TikTok plans to widely release peer-to-peer payments.

TikTok did not immediately respond to TechCrunch’s request for comment.

It’s worth noting that this isn’t the first time TikTok has tried to push further into financial services. Reuters reported earlier this year that TikTok had applied to Brazil’s central bank for approval to operate as a financial technology company offering lending and payment services.

Although TikTok is widely described as a social media giant, it has gradually expanded beyond that category thanks to additions such as robust search, TikTok Shop, a local discovery map, games, hotel bookings, and more. By introducing peer-to-peer payments, TikTok would be competing with services like Venmo and Zelle.

TikTok isn’t the only social network pushing into financial services, as X, formerly known as Twitter, recently launched X Money to allow users to send each other money.