“But why would Israel want access to the data of European citizens?” – in a new FTM podcast, journalist Sebastiaan Brommersma discusses findings from an investigation with Siem Eikelenboom into how tech company Zivver, which promised to keep Europe’s health and legal data safe, can in fact access private messages – and how that data ended up within reach of a U.S. firm run by former Israeli intelligence officers.

How Google fooled Brussels: the tech giant’s playbook exposed

“If we don’t set those correct principles on clear cases of antitrust violations, that also sends a message for the future: future technologies can be monopolised by even more unscrupulous actors”, an expert said, commenting on FTM’s new investigation about Google.

The tech giant, whose system powers the world’s largest search engine and controls three in four smartphones, has played Brussels like a fiddle – shaping laws, silencing rivals and convincing the world its dominance was built on innovation, not manipulation. Europe vows to restore fair competition, but after record fines and years of lobbying, will it ever rein in Google’s power?

Read the investigation

Watchdog slams EU executive for hiding user risks on Elon Musk’s X

🚨📱 Under the EU’s Digital Services Act, X is supposed to report user-safety risks – from child abuse to terrorism. But much of that data never saw the light of day.

Brussels has kept the platform’s reports confidential, and now an EU watchdog says the Commission went too far – shielding X instead of the public.

Read the update