What Big Tech Doesn’t Want You to Know – and What to Do About It

Over the past two decades, a handful of technology companies have transformed how we communicate, consume information and participate in public life. Yet while their influence has grown, efforts to hold them accountable have struggled to keep pace.

Baroness Beeban Kidron has spent more than a decade at the centre of that fight. As a filmmaker, campaigner and legislator, she has challenged some of the world's most powerful companies over issues ranging from children's rights and online safety to privacy, democracy and the concentration of corporate power.

In conversation with Misha Glenny, Kidron reflects on what she has learned from years spent confronting Silicon Valley, lobbying governments and helping shape digital regulation in Britain and beyond. Drawing on her experiences in Parliament, the United Nations and the corridors of power on both sides of the Atlantic, she explores how technology companies acquired unprecedented influence over public life, and why democratic institutions have struggled to respond.

This is a timely conversation about power, accountability and the future of democracy in the digital age. As artificial intelligence, social media and platform technologies become ever more deeply embedded in society, what kind of rules, protections and public oversight are needed to ensure that technology serves citizens rather than the other way around?

Join us for an evening examining one of the defining political and social challenges of our time.

Baroness Beeban Kidron is a leading advocate for digital accountability and children's rights online. A crossbench member of the House of Lords, she is the Founder and Chair of 5Rights Foundation and has played a significant role in shaping digital regulation and online safety standards internationally. Before entering public life, she was an award-winning film director whose work included Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason and the documentary InRealLife.

Misha Glenny is an award-winning journalist, broadcaster and author specialising in organised crime, cybercrime, technology and geopolitics. His books include McMafia, DarkMarket and The Balkans: Nationalism, War and the Great Powers. A former BBC correspondent, he is widely recognised as one of the leading commentators on the intersection of technology, power and global security.