We knew this, but now it's increasingly such a part of the written record that even the United Nations Office on Human Rights has made a statement.

Stepping into a fierce debate over digital privacy rights, the U.N. office says it has strong evidence of a growing complicity among private companies in government spying. It says governments around the world are using both the law and covert methods to access private content and metadata.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said the lack of transparency and tactics extend to governments' "de facto coercion of companies to gain broad access to information and data on citizens without them knowing."

[Ed. note: So who are these private companies, and are they hiring? Because it seems like a bit of a growth industry at the moment: job security, woo hoo!]

A group of scientists and enthusiasts are undertaking one of the most ambitious and interdisciplinary crowdfunded projects ever attempted:

They want to resurrect a long-dead satellite and send it on a close-range flyby of the Moon. The public has taken an inordinate interest in this resurrection plan, funding its RocketHub project to the tune of $160,000 - but the dream is quickly evaporating. The International Sun/Earth Explorer-3 (ISEE-3), which finished its original mission more than 30 years ago, has just days left in which to troubleshoot the satellite's many remaining problems. At this point the question is not whether the team can do everything they'd hoped, but how much of the original dream they can salvage.

This is interesting at every level. The satellite itself is interesting, this project is too, but the level of interest and effort that has gone into the RocketHub project is really amazing. Good luck, team!