Of Luddites and Zizians

In another uncanny echo of the Luddite era in today’s anti-data center protests, Wired reported this week on a tranche of leaked documents from the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI discussing a new domestic threat: anti-technology extremists.

Among the trove is a report prepared by the New York Intelligence and Counterterrorism Bureau warning of the potential for widespread upheaval in response to AI adoption. "The chaotic atmosphere that may result from emergent AI technology in the next five years may fuel large-scale protests that devolve into civil unrest and anti-tech violent extremist activity, especially in large urban areas such as New York City," the report reads.

The Luddite movement ultimately was undone by a combination of state surveillance and state suppression in response to Luddites’ own proclivities for what might be described as “anti-tech violent extremist activity,” in their case, smashing up textile machinery. In the documents obtained by Wired, we see the beginnings of state surveillance of anti-data center protestors.

According to Wired, the concerns discussed in the documents likely relate to President Trump’s September 2025 National Security Memorandum directing the Justice Department to target anyone expressing “anti-American,” “anti-Christian,” or “anti-capitalist” views. Like the British authorities’ response to the Luddite rebellion, that is, the Trump administration views “anti-tech” sentiment as of a piece with a broader threat to the imperial order.

Today’s authorities have even found their own “Ned Lud.” The same New York Intelligence Bureau report describes a new threat emerging in the wake of the arrest and trial in Maryland of Jack LaSota, a transgender woman who goes by “Ziz,” and is purported to be the leader of a group of mostly young computer scientists who go by the name “Zizians,” and who allegedly hold extreme views about veganism, animal rights, gender identity and AI.

Like those acting in the name of Ned Lud, the Zizians pose a genuine a threat of violence. Members of the group have been connected to the death of a California landlord, the shooting death of one of the member’s parents in Pennsylvania and a highway shootout in Vermont that led to the deaths of a border agent as well as a member of the group. Despite the apparent connections, no member has yet been charged in any of the deaths.

Yet, while “Ned Lud” was an apocryphal figure, conjured to strike fear in mill owners and the authorities, “Ziz” may simply be crazy. In March, the judge overseeing her trial ordered her held in custody while a mental competency exam is performed. The self-described “Zizians” appear to be closer to a violent cult than to a political or popular movement—Manson Family than Montgomery bus boycott.

Most of the anti-data center protests, of course, have nothing to do with Ziz or the Zizians, although there have been sporadic incidents of violence. An Indianapolis city councilman who supported a local data center had 13 rounds fired at his house, and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman had a Molotov cocktail thrown at his home. Threats of violence against individuals, policymakers and AI companies have proliferated online, along with threats of physical sabotage of data centers already in operation.

The threat of political violence is unfortunately very real in the U.S. right now. And anti-AI sentiment, focused on data centers, appears to be intensifying, not abating. So, the possibility of more anti-AI related violence can’t be discounted.

And if history is anything to go by, the specter of “anti-tech violent extremist activity,” will be invoked to justify increasingly invasive and forceful countermeasures.

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