9 ms·

It's fairly remarkable to see how weaponized misinformation is becoming. Here's a snippet from Wikipedia[1] detailing the background behind the already-very-du

by jka 7y ago

It's fairly remarkable to see how weaponized misinformation is becoming. Here's a snippet from Wikipedia[1] detailing the background behind the already-very-dubiously-named Local Government Information Services -- which is in no way a federally (or even regionally) accredited institution: "Locality Labs published Hinsdale School News, a newspaper that masqueraded as the student publication of a high school in Hinsdale, Illinois by using the logo of Hinsdale Township High School District 86. In March 2019, the publication released a number of articles opposing a Hinsdale referendum that would increase the school district's budget by $140 million.[1] Officials from District 86 sent a cease and desist letter to Franklin Archer, LGIS, and other related companies, claiming that their publication of the Hinsdale School News was deceptive and violated trademark law.[5]" This is a wake-up call for authenticity. Regardless of whether foreign influence is involved -- and it can be very challenging to determine whether it is -- U.S. nationals are taking actions that imitate authority without possessing it. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_Government_Information_Services https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_Government_Information_S...

koheripbal 7y ago
I think far more concerning are the cases where the perpetrators are foreign entities.
- jka 7y ago
  The effect could be the same regardless of source, and the attribution could become fractally difficult depending on how many channels of influence are available to the perpetrator. Personally, I'd recommend that people focus on the results of the actions that are taking place, and devise measures to lead or redirect those towards positive outcomes. The time spent attempting to attribute nefarious outside actors -- even if you end up being correct -- could end up essentially wasted relative to the real-world impact that has occurred. Edit: I'm not suggesting that attribution or recording provenance are not worthwhile. They are valuable, especially in future. But focus should remain on what is going to happen in the near-term as a result of real-world actions.
  - empath75 7y ago
    Foreign actors have different motivations— and most importantly, don’t have to live in a country if they destroy it with terrible policies.
    - Smoosh 7y ago
      This is also true of the very wealthy.
      - empath75 7y ago
        That’s pretty insightful, honestly.
    - vkou 7y ago
      There are plenty of non-foreigners who: 1. Have nefarious motivations. 2. Stand to benefit directly from the terrible policies they wish to enact. You're making the mistake of thinking that just because they wear your colours, mean that they care about your team's success. They don't. They do, however, appreciate the foreign/not-foreign red herring get used as a point of distraction.
- stainforth 7y ago
  Step 1: Deflect.
- smolder 7y ago
  And maybe slightly more concerning still that those foreign entities may or may not be doing favors for domestic entities.
- RobertoG 7y ago
  I find more concerning this (from the article): 'A number of other sites — such as reopennc.com — seem to exist merely to sell t-shirts, decals and yard signs with such slogans as “Know Your Rights,” “Live Free or Die,” and “Facts not Fear.' I mean, that marketing tools would be used for political gain was to be expected, but, it seems that we have arrived to a point where politics is used for marketing. One thing is to sell t-shirts with slogans and another is to create (or amplify) a movement in order to sell t-shirts, regardless of the consequences. I suppose that, as so many things, once you are inside the vortex it's difficult to tell the difference.
tomcam 7y ago
> very-dubiously-named Local Government Information Services Not trying to be arch here: Federal Express is an equally hinky name, isn't it? I've always thought it was confusingly, well, federal-sounding.
- bzusb 7y ago
  I'm not American and because of the name I've always assumed federal express was government-related.
  - cpeterso 7y ago
    And don't confuse UPS (United Parcel Service) and USPS (United States Postal Service).
    - baby 7y ago
      For the longest time I thought these were the same companies
    - sfj 7y ago
      Or Uninteruptable Power Supply. When I got my first job, I always wondered why our company designated the UPS with their own room on the floor map...
    - ptha 7y ago
      Then there's the band "The Postal Service" that got a cease and desist from USPS to stop using their trademark. However it had a happy ending: the United States Postal Service -- the real one, as in stamps and letters -- signed an agreement with Sub Pop granting a free license to use the name in exchange for working to promote using the mail. Future copies of the album and the group's follow-up work will have a notice about the trademark, while the federal Postal Service will sell the band's CD's on its Web site, potentially earning a profit. The band may do some television commercials for the post office. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/06/arts/music/postal-service-tale-indie-rock-snail-mail-and-trademark-law.html https://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/06/arts/music/postal-service...
beirut_bootleg 7y ago
There is already an ongoing and massive automated astroturfing campaign using hundreds of faked local news websites (news|times|standard|reporter|record|today.com) run by Metric Media, Locality Labs, Record Inc. and possibly others [1]. This reopen*.com wave is just more of the same, but I thank you for making the connection obvious to me. There is also an ongoing crowdsourced investigation that is committed to exposing these misinformation campaigns that I'm sure would welcome your assistance [2]. [1] - https://github.com/MassMove/AttackVectors/blob/master/LocalJournals/sites.csv https://github.com/MassMove/AttackVectors/blob/master/LocalJ... [2] - https://www.reddit.com/r/MassMove/ https://www.reddit.com/r/MassMove/
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- pstuart 7y ago
  Thanks for the links, this is good stuff!
- Balgair 7y ago
  Krebs links to a google doc in the article as well here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1k-GgWMNhg1se5302MCBhHxmBJnEhvlc9OL_ONDfEsas/edit#gid=1824125632 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1k-GgWMNhg1se5302MCBh... To note, Krebs has ~700 sites listed. Go ahead and ctrl+F for a city near you to see. The format of each of them is pretty cookie-cutter but the articles and pictures had a lot of work put into them. For instance, here is one: https://metroeastsun.com/ https://metroeastsun.com/ Looking at this, I would never suspect that it was just a fraud. Looking at the headlines for the articles, it's pretty corruption heavy and seems to have a thing about government workers being paid, also a lot of white people smiling or pointing fingers while in suits. TinEye reports that the few photos that I bothered to check are all unique, whatever that may mean. Googling for lines in a few of the articles gets you back to that site and not others. Still, it's not even remotely out of line, just a bit odd when you look at it. But we know it's not just odd, we know it's fake news. Even a bit of digging on the articles and photos points to it passing a sniff test. Without Krebs telling me that it stunk like a fish market, I'd never know.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
libtard123 7y ago
Oh stfu you fucking liberal.
jimkleiber 7y ago
Twitter got sued back in the day by Tony LaRussa, former coach of the St. Louis Cardinals, for letting people impersonate his account—and thus the verified blue check was born. So now impersonation is just getting more nuanced, on Twitter, FB, DNS, Skype, Zoom, robocalls, Tinder, you name it. If someone impersonates someone in person in the US, it’s probably a fine or an arrest. If someone does it on the internet, well, more often than not we can’t tell and even if we do know who did it, we may try them in the US but if outside, not much of a chance. Why do you think we haven’t demanded that tech companies and governments solve this problem?
- nradov 7y ago
  It is generally not illegal to impersonate someone. You will only be fined or arrested if there is an actual crime involved, like fraud.
- dr-detroit 7y ago
  The tech companies receive their funding from bad actors because our economy was restructured to prevent another amazon, ebay, or other disruptive startup from ever having a traditional IPO on equal footing with our government sponsored oligopoly firms. (Petit, 2016)
- zo1 7y ago
  > Why do you think we haven’t demanded that tech companies and governments solve this problem? Privacy is almost always the answer to that one. Either that, or "to protect people from totalitarian governments". Honestly, I understand that, but I'm disappointed that no one goes further and says "Hey, let's see if we can solve both problems at the same time whilst maintaining security and privacy."
  - specialist 7y ago
    Easy solution. Verified works get signed by their content maker. Tony LaRussa is verified. Twitter issues him a cert. All of Tony LaRussa's works are signed with that cert. Revoke the cert if there's ever a problem. Not really Tony LaRussa. Someone hacks his accounts. He passes away. Etc. Unsigned works still permitted. But everyone knows no one claims the work as their own.
mehrdadn 7y ago
I think it's disinformation at this point, not misinformation.
A4ET8a8uTh0 7y ago
Thank you for pointing it out. I am here and I had no idea about it. And just before anyone jumps in saying it is nothing new, note the industrial scale at which it is happening and the impact it may be having. I know I trust local publications a little more.
ergl 7y ago
How do you define "authenticity"?
- specialist 7y ago
  Doesn't matter. What matters is transparent process for issuing, revoking, adjudicating authentication. Every authenticator can have their own process.
specialist 7y ago
"This is a wake-up call for authenticity." Emphatic agreement. Signed work is journalism. Unsigned work is gossip, propaganda. Much too much effort is being expended on determining truthiness. Pure futility. Meanwhile, I haven't found any efforts by content providers to sign their works. So consumers can have some sense of provenance. Use trusted certs. Any one caught impersonating someone else has their certs revoked.

by jka 7y ago

koheripbal 7y ago

I think far more concerning are the cases where the perpetrators are foreign entities.

jka 7y ago
The effect could be the same regardless of source, and the attribution could become fractally difficult depending on how many channels of influence are available to the perpetrator. Personally, I'd recommend that people focus on the results of the actions that are taking place, and devise measures to lead or redirect those towards positive outcomes. The time spent attempting to attribute nefarious outside actors -- even if you end up being correct -- could end up essentially wasted relative to the real-world impact that has occurred. Edit: I'm not suggesting that attribution or recording provenance are not worthwhile. They are valuable, especially in future. But focus should remain on what is going to happen in the near-term as a result of real-world actions.
- empath75 7y ago
  Foreign actors have different motivations— and most importantly, don’t have to live in a country if they destroy it with terrible policies.
  - Smoosh 7y ago
    This is also true of the very wealthy.
    - empath75 7y ago
      That’s pretty insightful, honestly.
  - vkou 7y ago
    There are plenty of non-foreigners who: 1. Have nefarious motivations. 2. Stand to benefit directly from the terrible policies they wish to enact. You're making the mistake of thinking that just because they wear your colours, mean that they care about your team's success. They don't. They do, however, appreciate the foreign/not-foreign red herring get used as a point of distraction.
stainforth 7y ago
Step 1: Deflect.
smolder 7y ago
And maybe slightly more concerning still that those foreign entities may or may not be doing favors for domestic entities.
RobertoG 7y ago
I find more concerning this (from the article): 'A number of other sites — such as reopennc.com — seem to exist merely to sell t-shirts, decals and yard signs with such slogans as “Know Your Rights,” “Live Free or Die,” and “Facts not Fear.' I mean, that marketing tools would be used for political gain was to be expected, but, it seems that we have arrived to a point where politics is used for marketing. One thing is to sell t-shirts with slogans and another is to create (or amplify) a movement in order to sell t-shirts, regardless of the consequences. I suppose that, as so many things, once you are inside the vortex it's difficult to tell the difference.

tomcam 7y ago

> very-dubiously-named Local Government Information Services Not trying to be arch here: Federal Express is an equally hinky name, isn't it? I've always thought it was confusingly, well, federal-sounding.

bzusb 7y ago
I'm not American and because of the name I've always assumed federal express was government-related.
- cpeterso 7y ago
  And don't confuse UPS (United Parcel Service) and USPS (United States Postal Service).
  - baby 7y ago
    For the longest time I thought these were the same companies
  - sfj 7y ago
    Or Uninteruptable Power Supply. When I got my first job, I always wondered why our company designated the UPS with their own room on the floor map...
  - ptha 7y ago
    Then there's the band "The Postal Service" that got a cease and desist from USPS to stop using their trademark. However it had a happy ending: the United States Postal Service -- the real one, as in stamps and letters -- signed an agreement with Sub Pop granting a free license to use the name in exchange for working to promote using the mail. Future copies of the album and the group's follow-up work will have a notice about the trademark, while the federal Postal Service will sell the band's CD's on its Web site, potentially earning a profit. The band may do some television commercials for the post office. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/06/arts/music/postal-service-tale-indie-rock-snail-mail-and-trademark-law.html https://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/06/arts/music/postal-service...

beirut_bootleg 7y ago

There is already an ongoing and massive automated astroturfing campaign using hundreds of faked local news websites (news|times|standard|reporter|record|today.com) run by Metric Media, Locality Labs, Record Inc. and possibly others [1]. This reopen*.com wave is just more of the same, but I thank you for making the connection obvious to me. There is also an ongoing crowdsourced investigation that is committed to exposing these misinformation campaigns that I'm sure would welcome your assistance [2]. [1] - https://github.com/MassMove/AttackVectors/blob/master/LocalJournals/sites.csv https://github.com/MassMove/AttackVectors/blob/master/LocalJ... [2] - https://www.reddit.com/r/MassMove/ https://www.reddit.com/r/MassMove/

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
pstuart 7y ago
Thanks for the links, this is good stuff!
Balgair 7y ago
Krebs links to a google doc in the article as well here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1k-GgWMNhg1se5302MCBhHxmBJnEhvlc9OL_ONDfEsas/edit#gid=1824125632 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1k-GgWMNhg1se5302MCBh... To note, Krebs has ~700 sites listed. Go ahead and ctrl+F for a city near you to see. The format of each of them is pretty cookie-cutter but the articles and pictures had a lot of work put into them. For instance, here is one: https://metroeastsun.com/ https://metroeastsun.com/ Looking at this, I would never suspect that it was just a fraud. Looking at the headlines for the articles, it's pretty corruption heavy and seems to have a thing about government workers being paid, also a lot of white people smiling or pointing fingers while in suits. TinEye reports that the few photos that I bothered to check are all unique, whatever that may mean. Googling for lines in a few of the articles gets you back to that site and not others. Still, it's not even remotely out of line, just a bit odd when you look at it. But we know it's not just odd, we know it's fake news. Even a bit of digging on the articles and photos points to it passing a sniff test. Without Krebs telling me that it stunk like a fish market, I'd never know.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

libtard123 7y ago

Oh stfu you fucking liberal.

jimkleiber 7y ago

Twitter got sued back in the day by Tony LaRussa, former coach of the St. Louis Cardinals, for letting people impersonate his account—and thus the verified blue check was born. So now impersonation is just getting more nuanced, on Twitter, FB, DNS, Skype, Zoom, robocalls, Tinder, you name it. If someone impersonates someone in person in the US, it’s probably a fine or an arrest. If someone does it on the internet, well, more often than not we can’t tell and even if we do know who did it, we may try them in the US but if outside, not much of a chance. Why do you think we haven’t demanded that tech companies and governments solve this problem?

nradov 7y ago
It is generally not illegal to impersonate someone. You will only be fined or arrested if there is an actual crime involved, like fraud.
dr-detroit 7y ago
The tech companies receive their funding from bad actors because our economy was restructured to prevent another amazon, ebay, or other disruptive startup from ever having a traditional IPO on equal footing with our government sponsored oligopoly firms. (Petit, 2016)
zo1 7y ago
> Why do you think we haven’t demanded that tech companies and governments solve this problem? Privacy is almost always the answer to that one. Either that, or "to protect people from totalitarian governments". Honestly, I understand that, but I'm disappointed that no one goes further and says "Hey, let's see if we can solve both problems at the same time whilst maintaining security and privacy."
- specialist 7y ago
  Easy solution. Verified works get signed by their content maker. Tony LaRussa is verified. Twitter issues him a cert. All of Tony LaRussa's works are signed with that cert. Revoke the cert if there's ever a problem. Not really Tony LaRussa. Someone hacks his accounts. He passes away. Etc. Unsigned works still permitted. But everyone knows no one claims the work as their own.

mehrdadn 7y ago

I think it's disinformation at this point, not misinformation.

A4ET8a8uTh0 7y ago

Thank you for pointing it out. I am here and I had no idea about it. And just before anyone jumps in saying it is nothing new, note the industrial scale at which it is happening and the impact it may be having. I know I trust local publications a little more.

ergl 7y ago

How do you define "authenticity"?

specialist 7y ago
Doesn't matter. What matters is transparent process for issuing, revoking, adjudicating authentication. Every authenticator can have their own process.

specialist 7y ago

"This is a wake-up call for authenticity." Emphatic agreement. Signed work is journalism. Unsigned work is gossip, propaganda. Much too much effort is being expended on determining truthiness. Pure futility. Meanwhile, I haven't found any efforts by content providers to sign their works. So consumers can have some sense of provenance. Use trusted certs. Any one caught impersonating someone else has their certs revoked.