I write about technology, biometrics, immigration, & borders for a variety of platforms, ranging from top academic presses to popular blogs. Below are some of my recent publications:
Blog posts
Carbon Fingerprints. London Review of Books (LRB) Blog (14 February 2023).
Researching Digital Identity in Times of Crisis. Workshop Report for the Alan Turing Institute (August 2021).
Gateway or Barrier? The Contested Politics of Humanitarian Biometrics. Datafication and Digital Rights (blog) (12 January 2021).
Passing as a Refugee. Africa is a Country (10 November 2020).
Machine-Readable Refugees. London Review of Books (LRB) Blog (14 September 2020).
Conversation with Ruben Andersson. Africa is a Country (9 July 2018).
Unthinking Refugee Studies. Africa is a Country (11 April 2018).
Conversation with Abdul Adan. Africa is a Country (11 October 2017)
Jeffrey Gettleman's Tired Tome. Africa is a Country (21 August 2017).
Can African States Offer New Approaches to Refugee Asylum? Africa is a Country (23 December 2016)
In Kenya, You Cannot Go Anywhere Without an ID. I Don’t Have One. Mail & Guardian (13 April 2020).
Mobile Credit Expands Mass Surveillance of Ordinary Kenyans. Coda Story (11 September 2019).
Kenya's Controversial Biometric Project is Shrouded in Secrecy. Coda Story (3 May 2019).
Biometrics from the Margins (In Progress).
The Other Climate Technology (In Progress)
Reports for Civil Society Groups
A Very British Problem: The Evolution of Britain's Militarized Industrial Complex. Report for Campaign Against the Arms Trade (4 August 2022).
Biometrics Collection Under the Pretext of Counter-Terrorism. Case Study of Israel/Palestine and Case Study of Somalia. Report for Privacy International (28 May 2021).
Defending the Rights of Refugees and Migrants in the Digital Age. Report for Amnesty International (forthcoming). Co-authored with Roya Pakzad.
Academic Publications
Globalizing Racism and De-provincializing Muslim Africa. Modern Intellectual History 19, no. 3(May 2021): 912-933. Co-authored with Alden Young.
Between Surveillance and Recognition: Rethinking Digital Identity in Aid. Big Data and Society 8, no 1 (1 April 2021). Co-authored with Margie Cheesman, Aaron Martin, and Emrys Schoemaker.
Biometrics, Race Making, and White Exceptionalism: The Controversy Over Universal Fingerprinting in Post-World War II Kenya. The Journal of African History 61:1 (March 2020): 23-43.