There is a lot of technology created for use in space that also finds applications here on Earth. One is radar technology that can hear human heartbeats underneath rock and dust. It’s being used to search for survivors after a 7.1 magnitude earthquake hit Mexico City last week. Tech like this gets licensed to private companies through a NASA spinoff program. Marketplace Tech host Molly Wood talks to Dan Lockney, who leads the Technology Transfer Program.

Politicians, the public and regulators are all starting to see the power of social media companies. Particularly Facebook. That company said last week it would give Congress thousands of political ads linked to a possible Russian propaganda campaign. Facebook will also update its ad technology to try to keep political advertising in check. But it’s looking more and more like Facebook’s days of sell first, apologize later could be coming to an end. We talk about the social pressure on Facebook to change.

There are whole new systems of money being traded in the digital world. Companies can create their own cryptocurrency and sell it to the public in an initial coin offering. But these offerings are unregulated and risky. Marketplace Tech host Molly Wood talks to Kevin Werbach from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School about how initial coin offerings work.

As the demand for online retail grows, so do warehouse and fulfillment centers. But most of us who order stuff online don’t actually know what goes into getting a product off a shelf, into a box and to our door. On today’s episode of Marketplace Tech, we follow Veronica Mena, a warehouse supervisor for the online store Boxed to see what goes into packing your shipments of bulk toilet paper and how automation is changing the industry.

Some 143 million people had their personal information stolen in the Equifax data breach. And that has a lot of us asking: How did we get here? Marketplace Tech host Molly Wood talks to Nancy Kim, who teaches internet studies at California Western School of Law, about why regulating data collection is so hard. And we hear from a few New Yorkers about their data security worries — or lack of them.

When a city becomes a tech hub, it usually also becomes a bubble: a housing bubble, a pay bubble and an industry bubble, to name a few. The tech world talks about these bubbles like they’re inevitable. But what if they aren’t? Marketplace Tech host Molly Wood talks to Seattle-based Glenn Kelman, who is the CEO of the real estate site Redfin, about tech employees’ stock payouts and how reporting them properly could distribute wealth more evenly throughout the country.

When we think space, we often think about observation — watching the skies and figuring out what’s out there. But some people are already thinking about how to put the assets up in space to good use. One way to do that? Asteroid mining. It may sound like science fiction, but established companies such as Caterpillar and startups such as Planetary Resources are putting real money into it. Our two resident space nerds, Molly Wood and Kimberly Adams, talk about this to kick off our series looking at the economics of outer space.

As machine learning becomes more prevalent, the conversation about robots taking our jobs gets more intense. Marketplace Tech host Molly Wood talks to Roy Bahat, head of Bloomberg Beta, which has been studying technology’s effect on the future of work. He said, robots or not, jobs are changing, and we should shift company culture and benefits along with them.

The federal government provides SNAP benefits, which stands for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly called food stamps, to those that need financial help to buy groceries. It’s a program that’s has not traditionally been on the cutting edge of tech. In fact, eight states won’t even let you apply for benefits online and only a few have apps that let you check your balance. Marketplace Tech host Molly Wood spoke with Jimmy Chen, CEO of Propel, which created the Fresh EBT app. It allows people to check their Electronic Benefits Transfer balance on their phone or computer. Plus, we go shopping with a SNAP benefit recipient and community activist in the South Bronx in New York City.