Shuffle (1981), dir. Gakuryū Ishii
Just a drone spewing fire to “remove a piece of plastic” from a high-voltage wire in China pic.twitter.com/fcNFz4GzcH
— Matt Novak (@paleofuture)February 17, 2017
What the men had in common was this: All were vocal proponents of Mexico’s 2014 soda tax, the first national soda tax of its kind. It is aimed at reducing consumption of sugary drinks in Mexico, where weight-related diseases kill more people every year than violent crime.
The links sent to the men were laced with an invasive form of spyware developed by NSO Group, an Israeli cyberarms dealer that sells its digital spy tools exclusively to governments and that has contracts with multiple agencies inside Mexico, according to company emails leaked to The New York Times last year.
Denmark recently announced that it would be creating a new diplomatic posting — a “digital ambassador” — to deal not with states and international organizations, but with giant technology companies like Facebook and Google. According to the Danish Foreign Ministry, it is the first such position in the world.