Magazine

MIT Technology Review magazine, released bimonthly, is the world's longest-running technology magazine.

September/October 2018
The politics issue
Technology is threatening our democracy.
How do we save it?
Letter from the Editor
Why the pessimists are winning, for now
Buy a digital copy of this issue  
  Previous Issue Next Issue  

Features

Connectivity

How social media took us from Tahrir Square to Donald Trump

To understand how digital technologies went from instruments for spreading democracy to weapons for attacking it, you have to look beyond the technologies themselves.
Photo of protester waving Egypt's flag.
Tech Policy
Technologists are trying to fix the “filter bubble” problem that tech helped create
Artificial Intelligence
Fake America great again
Computing
Hackers are out to jeopardize your vote
Tech Policy
Tim Hwang’s FiscalNote is revolutionizing Washington lobbying with big data
Intelligent Machines
The “neuropolitics” consultants who hack voters’ brains
Tech Policy
The simple but ingenious system Taiwan uses to crowdsource its laws
Tech Policy
Who needs democracy when you have data?
Photo of two surveillance cameras next to a portrait of Mao Zedong.

Also in this issue

Tech Policy

This is what filter bubbles actually look like

Maps of Twitter activity show how political polarization manifests online and why divides are so hard to bridge.

Tech Policy

US election campaign technology from 2008 to 2018, and beyond

The first Obama campaign kicked off a technological revolution in electioneering. Where is it going next?

Business Impact

China’s use of big data might actually make it less Big Brother-ish

Why the country’s adoption of ever-more-intrusive technology could, paradoxically, lead to stronger civil liberties.

Computing

Four big targets in the cyber battle over the US ballot box

Here’s how hackers could strike the 2018 midterm elections.

Business Impact

Kenya’s technology evolved. Its political problems stayed the same.

Long before the internet, hate speech flourished in echo chambers of a different kind.

Intelligent Machines

Future elections may be swayed by intelligent, weaponized chatbots

The AI advances that brought you Alexa are teaching propaganda how to talk.

Intelligent Machines

The four ways that ex-internet idealists explain where it all went wrong

21st-century digital evangelists had a lot in common with early Christians and Russian revolutionaries.

Science Fiction

Noon in the antilibrary

Science fiction: What happens when fake news is everywhere?

Intelligent Machines

How to tell if you’re arguing with a bot

MIT Technology Review helps you figure out who is on the other side of your debate.

Past Issues