Freedom of speech needs freedom of thought
A new book has convinced our writer that we should be thinking about how our right to free speech contributes to the public good
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Israel bans Sudanese activists from protesting outside the UAE embassy in Tel Aviv
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Spotlight: A tribute to Judith Vidal-Hall
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Leicester: city of migration
Migration has transformed Leicester from a dull provincial market town into the vibrant capital of Asia in Britain
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An exceptional editor: a tribute to Judith Vidal-Hall who reinvented Index magazine after the end of the Cold War
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Vidal-Hall on 14 years at Index exposing censorship happening under our nose
The former editor of Index discusses working with Noam Chomsky, 9/11 and interviewing Orban before his far right swing
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Judith Vidal-Hall: Taking on the giant
When a group of claimants in the UK took on Google for invasion of privacy, they had little idea that the case would become a landmark in the fight...
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MAGAZINE
LATEST ISSUE: VOLUME 54.03 Autumn 2025
Truth, trust & tricksters: Free expression in the age of AI
It is difficult to spend a day without using artificial intelligence. Whether we look up a fact on Google or use our car’s navigation system, AI is helping to guide us. AI is not human, but is increasingly taking on human characteristics. Want to write a five-year strategy for work? AI can give you the structure. A text to the lover you’re breaking up with, ChatGPT is on hand with the perfect choice of words. Even as I compose this editor’s letter in a Word document, the sinisterly named Copilot – Microsoft’s AI assistant – is hovering in the margin with the tantalising offer that it could do a better job.
So what does it all mean for free expression? We asked a range of writers to explore themes around censorship and AI for this latest issue, and the result is fascinating. Kate Devlin delves into griefbots which are essentially deepfakes of dead people – often with all their unpleasant characteristics removed.
Innocent enough but in the wrong hands they are pernicious. A country’s political hero can be resurrected to encourage causes they would have disavowed were they alive. Ruth Green looks at whether AI has free speech.
In a recent US lawsuit, the owner of a chatbot which had been talking to a teenager, in a sexualised way, before he killed himself, argued that the bot’s communications were covered by the First Amendment. Luckily the judge threw the case out.
Meanwhile Timandra Harkness examines how AI can trawl social media to discover every word you’ve ever written.
Uncensored gallery
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