Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Twitter develop technology to identify extremism
Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Twitter on Monday announced they had joined forces in an attempt to curb explicit terrorist imagery online.
The move follows criticism from Brussels that big US social media groups have made insufficient effort to clamp down on hate speech.
In a statement, the technology groups said they were building new technology that would identify extremist content, including terrorist recruitment videos and images of executions, via a digital fingerprint known as a “hash”, which would then be compiled into a shared global database. Once created, the hash would be attached like a watermark to content, which would then be easy to identify and take down.
Ridgewood NJ , The NYT reported yesterday that major websites were inaccessible to people across many parts of the United States on Friday after a company that manages crucial parts of the internet’s infrastructure said it was under attack.
Waves of cyber attacks brought down many popular websites Friday, leaving millions of users without access and the Department of Homeland Security investigating the precise cause.
Users reported problems reaching several websites, including Twitter, Netflix, Spotify, Airbnb, Reddit, Etsy, SoundCloud and The New York Times.This just a little over a month after the US Internet Giveaway to the U.N. and days after the Obama administration attempted to take Julian Assange founder of WikiLeaks off the internet.
This just a little over a month after the US Internet giveaway to the U.N. and days after the Obama administration attempted to take Julian Assange founder of WikiLeaks off the internet.
The attack, which is believed to be a coordinated effort, targeted a single Domain Name Server provider called Dyn. Dyn’s servers monitor and reroute internet traffic. The attack started just around 7am and is known as a distributed denial of service attack, or DDoS. No information is obtained with DDoS attacks, they create major frustration. The DDoS attack affected Dyn’s infrastructure that supports internet connections, meaning the attack did not affect websites themselves. Instead, it blocked or slowed users from gaining access to sites.
According to the NYT , the attack appears to have relied on hundreds of thousands of internet-connected devices like cameras, baby monitors and home routers that have been infected — without their owners’ knowledge — with software that allows hackers to command them to flood a target with overwhelming traffic.
WikiLeaks believes its supporters were responsible and it urged its supporters to ‘stop taking down the US internet’, saying ‘Mr Assange is still alive and WikiLeaks is still publishing’.
It then tweeted: ‘The Obama administration should not have attempted to misuse its instruments of state to stop criticism of its ruling party candidate.’
The Ridgewood Blog remained largely unaffected which was a great relief to both the staff and our IT department . Giving past attempts to take down the site by some politicians , local and otherwise and foreign governments ,founder James Foytlin aka PJ blogger said ,”it’s nice to be left out of the fray” . Other staff members postulated that perhaps a more open posture to Wikileaks had left the (Ridgewood)blog unscathed.
Ridgewood NJ, if you are looking to follow the great debate tonight on line here are some options for streaming and social media .Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and Republican nominee Donald Trump will square off at 9 pm Eastern at Hofstra University.
Of course all of the networks and major cable outlets have an online presence, so of course they are streaming the debates along with digital-first outlets like Buzzfeed News, The Daily Caller, Huffington Post, Politico, and Yahoo. Telemundo, theWall Street Journal, and Hulu will stream it, too.
Also look for Facebook Live broadcasts from journalists and those packed into Hofstra. Twitter will use the same live streaming system it uses for Thursday night football, trading sacks for fact checks and leaning on Bloomberg for footage. The candidates won’t be wearing Specs, but Snapchat will compile Live Stories for bite-sized debate nuggets. YouTube will feature coverage from NBC News, PBS, Fox News, The Washington Post, Bloomberg, and Telemundo.
There is no such thing as Pro-Trump free speech as Clinton corporate allies serve up a carefully curated view of the campaign
By Liz Crokin • 08/12/16 8:30am
My dad always told me that conservative candidates have to work twice as hard as their liberal opponents to win elections because they’re fighting two opponents: the Democratic Party and the media.
The usual suspects from left-leaning major media outlets like The New York Times, MSNBC, CNN and even entertainment networks are doing everything in their power to ensure a Clinton victory. Look no further than to Wolf Blitzermincing around and drinking wine at the Democratic convention, celebrating Hillary’s nomination. But the propaganda skewing this election runs much deeper than just the media: our iPhones, iPads, social media networks, Google and even video games are all in the tank for Hillary Clinton—and it’s chilling.
I began looking into how strong the bias and censorship runs in these forums after I did an interview on the pro-Trump podcast, MAGA. The show’s host, Mark Hammond, was disappointed Apple wouldn’t run his show without an “explicit” warning. Hammond’s podcast didn’t contain content that would be deemed explicit under Apple’s policy, and most other shows in the News & Politics category aren’t labeled as such.
The country’s most valuable and visible tech companies are making their presence felt in the 2016 presidential election.
Their efforts — some public, others less obvious to voters — are an aggressive play to make their brands an even biggerpart of the political process and cement their position in American life.
It’s a marked shift from 2008, the last election with nomination contests on both sides. That year technology was decisive in President Obama’s win but the companies weren’t nearly as dominant as they are today.
“To the extent that platforms like Facebook and Twitter position themselves, or [are] capitalizing or raising their profile, as sort of being central to democratic processes, I think they gain a legitimacy as being core information providers and information conduits in democracy,” said Daniel Kreiss, an assistant professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s School of Media and Journalism.
Tech companies are now regularly co-sponsors of primary debates, their logos visible behind candidatesduring broadcasts that are breaking ratings records.
More than half of the sanctioned primary debates this cycle have been co-sponsored by tech companies. That’s more than in 2012 and in 2008, when the only tech-network partnership, between CNN and YouTube, was treated as a novelty.
The companies are also influencing what gets onscreen. Google has has YouTube stars ask candidates questions and Facebook’s data is regularly referenced by debate moderators as a barometer of the public mood.
Sometimes, what’s happening on social networks affects, in real time, the questions asked on stage.
Social media exploded when Hillary Clinton defended raking in millions in Wall Street donations by saying she represented New York state on 9/11 during a November CBS debate co-sponsored by Twitter.
CBS producers with the help of an embedded Twitter team used new social tools to find a critical tweet. Moderators referenced it in a follow-up question.
“Fifty years of televised presidential debates and [it was] the first time that people yelling at the screen had their voice heard on the stage,” said Adam Sharp, the head of news, government and elections at Twitter.
Posted by Jonathan Levin Saturday, February 20, 2016 at 11:05am
Twitter, an invaluable news aggregator when properly run and used, has seemingly taken aim at conservatives and those advocating conservative causes.
In early January, Twitter stripped Breitbart Tech editor Milo Yiannopoulos (@Nero on Twitter) of his “verification,” saying he violated the anti-harassment Terms of Service.
A verified account means the user has a little blue checkmark next to his or her user name. It is Twitter’s way of affirming to all other users that this is, in fact, the person he or she claims to be. It sounds like a small thing, but Twitter, like so much social media, is rife with accounts purporting to be or that just look like a real public figure.
That verification checkmark tells all the other users that a particular account is the real thing. Having a verified account can be a big draw and boost followers who are otherwise reluctant to be suckered or drawn in by fakes. Stripping verification takes that mark of legitimacy away. It is also a sort of peculiar way to punish violations of terms of service. Assuming @Nero actually violated the terms of service, is the account somehow no longer Yiannopoulos’s?
Of course not. More important, it is not at all obvious that @Nero violated the terms of service at all. Stipulate that he is a troll who relishes destroying the Left’s sacred cows and laughs at the resulting discomfiture. Stipulate even that it’s really not nice and consciously deprives people of their “safe spaces.” So what? Five minutes on twitter reveals death threats by and against every possible demographic. Terror accounts proliferate. Anti-Semitism is rampant.
Leaving these accounts untouched but de-verifying a public figure like @Nero for violating the Terms of Service in the course of his public persona is nonsensical. Other Twitter methods for stifling anti-PC thought have come to light.
Rumours that Twitter has begun ‘shadowbanning’ politically inconvenient users have been confirmed by a source inside the company, who spoke exclusively to Breitbart Tech. His claim was corroborated by a senior editor at a major publisher.
According to the source, Twitter maintains a ‘whitelist’ of favoured Twitter accounts and a ‘blacklist’ of unfavoured accounts. Accounts on the whitelist are prioritised in search results, even if they’re not the most popular among users. Meanwhile, accounts on the blacklist have their posts hidden from both search results and other users’ timelines.
Our source was backed up by a senior editor at a major digital publisher, who told Breitbart that Twitter told him it deliberately whitelists and blacklists users. He added that he was afraid of the site’s power, noting that his tweets could disappear from users’ timelines if he got on the wrong side of the company.
Shadowbanning, sometimes known as “Stealth Banning” or “Hell Banning,” is commonly used by online community managers to block content posted by spammers. Instead of banning a user directly (which would alert the spammer to their status, prompting them to create a new account), their content is merely hidden from public view.
For site owners, the ideal shadowban is when a user never realizes he’s been shadowbanned.
However, Twitter isn’t merely targeting spammers. For weeks, users have been reporting that tweets from populist conservatives, members of the alternative right, cultural libertarians, and other anti-PC dissidents have disappeared from their timelines.
Speaking with host and Breitbart News Executive Chairman Stephen K. Bannon on Breitbart News Daily, Breitbart Tech editor Milo Yiannopoulos discussed the suppression of conservative voices by Twitter on the social media platform.
“Why are you beating up Twitter, and why are you saying that Twitter trying to suppress conservative voices, and why is Twitter’s stock in a total free fall because Milo’s taking them on?” Bannon asked. “Are you a bigger, badder guy than Jack Dorsey?”
“Yeah, of course I am,” Yiannopoulos replied mischievously. “I’m absolute convinced that Twitter is embarking on a war against conservative points of view, a war against what we might call ‘Generation Trump,’ the dissident, mischievous voices of the new counter-cultural alternative right wing and libertarian youth.”
“Look at who Twitter employs,” he warned in reference to Twitter possibly influencing the 2016 presidential election. “You know, this guy used to work with Hillary, this guy used to work with Obama…”
“This is why Obama ran the tables with Google and with Facebook,” Bannon agreed. “Let’s talk about Facebook for a second. Why is Facebook suppressing voices in the continent of Europe about immigration. Why is Zuckerberg in bed with Merkel?”
Referring to the story of Facebook teaming up with the German government to censor debate over the influx of Middle Eastern migrants, Yiannopoulos said, “This is what the left does all over the world. They’ll take ridicule and criticism and they’ll rebrand it as abuse and harrassment or hate speech in some way.”
JANUARY 8, 2016, 7:04 PM LAST UPDATED: SATURDAY, JANUARY 9, 2016, 12:23 AM
BY HANNAN ADELY
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD
A media frenzy that ignited after a Fair Lawn student was questioned about comments she made online about a “pro-Israel girl” in her school has left in its wake a worried family, a divided community, and a school that has been hammered by negative attention from around the world in an incident that some local residents say was misconstrued.
Bethany Koval
The controversy unfolded after high school junior Bethany Koval wrote, in detail, online, about being questioned by administrators over a tweet cheering that a pro-Israel student had “unfollowed” her on Twitter and her sharing the student’s name in a private message to a friend. She believed she was targeted by school administrators, she said, because of her anti-Israel political opinions on Twitter.
On Friday, Koval, 16, continued to draw wide support online as people viewed the incident as an attempt to stifle free speech and criticism of Israel. Locally, some residents defended the school, saying officials were only doing their duty to investigate a bullying allegation that a student had lodged against Koval.
By Jim Finkle and Dustin Volz
Reuters
December 29, 2015
By Jim Finkle and Dustin Volz
(Reuters) – Twitter Inc has clarified its definition of abusive behaviour that will prompt it to delete accounts, banning “hateful conduct” that promotes violence against specific groups.
The social media company disclosed the changes on Tuesday in a blog post, following rising criticism it was not doing enough to thwart Islamic State’s use of the site for propaganda and recruitment.
“As always, we embrace and encourage diverse opinions and beliefs, but we will continue to take action on accounts that cross the line into abuse,” Megan Cristina, director of Trust and Safety, said in the blog.
The new rules do not mention Islamic State or any other group by name.
“You may not promote violence against or directly attack or threaten other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability or disease,” according to the revised rules. ()
The company previously used a more generic warning that banned users from threatening or promoting “violence against others.”
Bruce Daisley, head of website in Europe, says it will expose the worst offenders by encouraging people to share lists of blocked users
By Tom Morgan
9:24AM GMT 26 Dec 2015
Twitter is giving its users new powers to block internet trolls amid claims abusive behaviour is hampering the social media site from catching up with Facebook.
Bruce Daisley, the head of Twitter in Europe, said the site would give its 320 millions users new tools to protect them from trolls and expose the worst offenders by encouraging people to share lists of blocked users.
Twitter, which celebrates its tenth birthday next year, is worth more than £22 billion but is lagging behind Facebook, which has more than one billion users and a valuation of £167 billion.
In February Dick Costolo, Twitter’s former chief executive, admitted in an internal email that the company “sucked” at dealing with trolls.
But Mr Daisley now says the site has cracked down on nuisance users who hurl extreme abuse at those they disagree with. Measures include contacting suspected trolls to tell them “what you are doing here exists in the real world” and encouraging people to publish lists of users they have blocked.
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 07/02/2015 21:15 -0400
Submitted by Michael Snyder via The End of The American Dream blog,
Have you ever come across someone on the Internet that you suspected was a paid government troll? Well, there is a very good chance that you were not imagining things. Thanks to Edward Snowden, we now have solid proof that paid government trolls are using “psychology-based influence techniques” on social media websites such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. Documents leaked by Snowden also reveal that government agents have been conducting denial-of-service attacks, flooding social media websites with thinly veiled propaganda and have been purposely attempting to warp public discourse online. If we do not stand up and object to this kind of Orwellian behavior, it is only going to get worse and worse.
In the UK, the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG) is a specialized unit within the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ). If it wasn’t for Edward Snowden, we probably still would never have heard of them. This particular specialized unit is engaged in some very “questionable” online activities. The following is an excerpt from a recent piece by Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Fishman…
Though its existence was secret until last year, JTRIG quickly developed a distinctive profile in the public understanding, after documents from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden revealedthat the unit had engaged in “dirty tricks” like deploying sexual “honey traps” designed to discredit targets, launching denial-of-service attacks to shut down Internet chat rooms, pushing veiled propaganda onto social networks and generally warping discourse online.
We are told that JTRIG only uses these techniques to go after the “bad guys”.
But precisely who are the “bad guys”?
It turns out that their definition of who the “bad guys” are is quite broad. Here is more from Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Fishman…
JTRIG’s domestic and law enforcement operations are made clear. The report states that the controversial unit “currently collaborates with other agencies” including the Metropolitan police, Security Service (MI5), Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), Border Agency, Revenue and Customs (HMRC), and National Public Order and Intelligence Unit (NPOIU). The document highlights that key JTRIG objectives include “providing intelligence for judicial outcomes”; monitoring “domestic extremist groups such as the English Defence League by conducting online HUMINT”; “denying, deterring or dissuading” criminals and “hacktivists”; and “deterring, disrupting or degrading online consumerism of stolen data or child porn.”
Particularly disturbing to me is the phrase “domestic extremist groups”. What does someone have to say or do to be considered an “extremist”? For example, the English Defence League is a non-violent street protest movement in the UK that is strongly against the spread of radical Islam and sharia law in the UK. So if they are “extremists”, how many millions upon millions of ordinary citizens in the United States would fit that definition?
When conducting operations against “extremists”, psychology-based influence techniques are among the tools that JTRIG uses to combat them online. The following comes from one of the documents that was posted by Greenwald and Fishman…
Chris Christie crushed on Twitter over Cowboys rooting
By Jonathan Lehman
December 15, 2014 | 11:15am
Chris Christie knows all about outrageous three-lane traffic snarls, so the New Jersey governor should be well prepared for the backlash he’s facing for backing the Cowboys over the Giants or Eagles — the two favorite teams of his constituents and the Cowboys’ sworn rivals.
Christie, the pivotal figure in the Bridgegate scandal and a long-rumored Republican presidential candidate for 2016, opened himself up to venom with a nationally televised appearance Sunday night in Cowboys owner Jerry Jones’ suite at Philadelphia’s Lincoln Financial Field.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie defended his longtime love for the Dallas Cowboys on Monday after his cheering for the team sparked a social media firestorm.
Christie was spotted high-fiving Cowboys owner Jerry Jones in a luxury box Sunday night at the Cowboys-Philadelphia Eagles game.
The interactions prompted a wave of hate on Twitter from angry Eagles fans, who apparently were unaware the governor has long been a Cowboys fan despite his New Jersey roots.
Christie responded to the meltdown Monday morning with an unscheduled appearance on WPG Talk Radio 1450.
He told listeners he’s never made a secret of his Cowboys fandom and said he would never change his team loyalties to score political points.
“I love passionate sports fans. I really do. I’m a passionate sports fan. And so I can’t say that I was the least bit surprised by the reaction of some Eagles fans,” he said
How Federal Agents Illegally Force Twitter, Google, and Banks to Turn Over Private Customer Data Without a Proper Warrant
Private companies are fighting the federal government in court over the Patriot Act’s “National Security Letters,” which violate the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution.
Earlier this week, FBI Director James Comey gave an interview to 60 Minutes during which he revealed a flawed understanding of personal freedom. He rightly distinguished what FBI agents do in their investigations of federal crimes from what the NSA does in its intelligence gathering, when the two federal agencies are looking for non-public data.
The FBI requires, Comey correctly asserted, articulable suspicion to commence an investigation and probable cause to obtain a search warrant. It does this because its agents have sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution, and their failure to comply with that oath may very well render the evidence obtained by unconstitutional means useless in court.
The NSA, as we know, makes no pretense about presenting probable cause to a judge. Rather, it asks a judge on a secret court (so secret that the judges themselves are kept from the court’s files) for general warrants. A warrant based on probable cause must specifically describe the place to be searched and the person or thing to be seized. General warrants, which the Constitution prohibits, permit the bearer to search wherever he wishes and seize whatever he finds.
Ellen DeGeneres, the Oscars, and the Selfie That Broke Twitter
Nick Gillespie|Mar. 3, 2014 8:34 am
While hosting the Academy Awards last night, Ellen DeGeneres tweeted this selfie that quickly set a record as the most retweeted item EVAH. Her caption: “If only Bradley’s arm was longer. Best photo ever.” The traffic on Twitter was so massive the service actually couldn’t keep up for a while.
As the Los Angeles Times wrote, the popularity of the image above easily busted the previous retweet record, which was held by President Barack Obama, who sometime in 2012 tweeted, “Four more years.”
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