The Download: our 35 young innovators and the “censorship-industrial complex”

Aug 12, 2026 19 approx.4min MIT Technology Review

Innovators AI Content Moderation Tech Ethics MIT Technology Review

The Download: our 35 young innovators and the “censorship-industrial complex”

This is today's edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what's going on in the world of technology.

How we picked 35 of the world’s top young scientists and engineers

On September 8, MIT Technology Review will reveal its 2026 list of Innovators Under 35, recognizing 35 young people from around the world who are doing groundbreaking scientific work and building clever technical fixes for sticky problems.

By finding the top young innovators globally and learning what they’re focused on in their work, we aim to give readers a sense of what advances to expect in the years to come.

As a newsroom, we also use this exercise to help us spot rising talent and get to know some of the best early-career researchers in the fields that we cover.

This year, we received 550 nominations. Find out how we whittled them down to 35 of the young innovators shaping the future of technology, and check out last year’s list.

—Amy Nordrum

How the “censorship-industrial complex” is changing the internet and US policy

—Eileen Guo

I first heard the term “censorship-industrial complex” on April 15, 2025. That’s when I got the tip that a small office in the US State Department, which focused on monitoring and countering foreign disinformation from the likes of Russia, Iran, and China, was facing imminent shutdown—the next day.

And the reason? The office was accused of serving as the department’s central hub in the so-called censorship-industrial complex—a sprawling constellation of government agencies, academics, civil society groups, and Big Tech platforms allegedly conspiring to suppress conservative and populist speech online under the guise of combating disinformation.

I broke the story on April 16. But for me, it was just the start of a deep reporting rabbit hole into an idea that had moved from the fringes of the right-wing internet into the Trump administration.

For more on what the narrative means for the internet, read my story here.

MIT Technology Review Narrated: Montana’s plan to become an experimental medical hub just pushed forward

At the end of July, any biotech company in Montana with an experimental drug gained a clear path to selling it to consumers.

Companies whose drugs have been through preliminary testing—sometimes in as few as 10 healthy people—can pay $12,500 to apply to a newly established review board. Once approved, they can set their own prices and sell the drugs through experimental treatment clinics, the first of which is likely to open around the end of this year.

Montana’s latest right-to-try legislation is unique. While similar laws elsewhere limit access to people with terminal illness, Montana’s system is theoretically open to anyone who gives informed consent and can pay. That includes people desperate for treatments for rare diseases. It also includes those interested in longevity and drugs pitched as preventive therapies.

—Jessica Hamzelou

This is our latest story to be turned into an MIT Technology Review Narrated podcast, which we publish each week on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Just navigate to MIT Technology Review Narrated on either platform, and follow us to get all our new content as it’s released.

The must-reads

I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.

1 China-linked hackers have hit Taiwan in an “unprecedented” AI attack
They used open-source agents to compromise government websites. (FT $)
+ UK military drones were found sending a signal to China. (Cybernews)
+ Taiwan’s “silicon shield” could be weakening. (MIT Technology Review)

2 Wall Street firms are paying $100,000 a month to get Trump posts first
Trump Media said more than 10 firms have signed up for the service. (CNN)
+ It offers faster access to market-moving posts on Truth Social. (BBC)
+ Trump Media also lost $238 million as crypto holdings fell. (CNBC)

3 ICE plans to give officers gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks
It’s set to spend up to $20 million to buy thousands of the devices. (AP News)
+ A switch turns them from normal gloves into “electrical mode.” (Guardian)

4 Spotify will label AI artists and stop recommending them
The platform is cracking down on fake performers. (Guardian)
+ “AI personas” will appear on artist profiles and track listings. (NYT $)

5 Social media spurred a deadly migrant surge from Morocco to Spain
Disinformation encouraged thousands to attempt the crossing. (NYT $)

6 Anthropic’s Claude is adding watermarks to AI text and images
It could guarantee votes are counted and kept anonymous. (Axios)

7 Drugs that mimic the brain’s wakefulness signal are taking off
Orexin drugs could treat sleep disorders, ADHD and addiction. (Economist $)
+ But psychedelics are falling short in clinical trials. (MIT Technology Review)

8 Cargo thieves have turned to violence to steal AI hardware
Shipments have disappeared after their escorts were attacked. (Wired $)

9 Scientists may have found the elusive glueball, a particle made of force
A Chinese collider has produced the strongest evidence yet. (Science)

10 A firm selling “100% human-written, never AI” research is entirely AI
The reviewers on the Research Gold site are AI-generated. (404 Media)

Quote of the day

“I think the fourth wave of slop will be when there's no longer any meaningful quality hit in slop, when the average piece of slop is better than the best human in that field.”

—Kevin Roose, a technology columnist at The New York Times, tells the Pivot podcast what the next stage of AI slop will look like.

One More Thing

PATRICK LEGER

Are we ready to hand AI agents the keys?

We’re starting to give AI agents real autonomy, and we’re not prepared for what could happen next. Any action that can be captured by text is potentially within the purview of AI agents—which is why they can cause so much mischief.

“The great paradox of agents is that the very thing that makes them useful—that they’re able to accomplish a range of tasks—involves giving away control,” says Iason Gabriel, a senior staff research scientist at Google DeepMind who focuses on AI ethics.

Researchers warn that agents could misinterpret goals, leak sensitive information, fall victim to prompt-injection attacks, and exploit software vulnerabilities at scale. And there’s no foolproof way to guarantee that they’ll act as their developers intend.

Here’s why giving AI agents more autonomy is dangerous.

—Grace Huckins

We can still have nice things

A place for comfort, fun, and distraction to brighten up your day. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line.)

+ An intrepid inventor has built and tested an anti-mosquito electric suit.
+ Musician Hasan Ceylan performs moving covers of modern hits on traditional Turkish instruments from the Ottoman era.
+ As the midterms approach, see whether you could draw electoral boundaries to rig an election at puzzle game Gerrymandle.
+ Photographer John Thomson's images from 19th-century China are an extraordinary peek into an ancient society that would soon be swept away.