4 ms·

US Army warns of Twitter dangers

16 points by ridertech 18y ago

randrews 18y ago
"Twitter has also become a social activism tool for socialists, human rights groups, communists, vegetarians, anarchists, religious communities, atheists, political enthusiasts, hacktivists and others to communicate with each other and to send messages to broader audiences" Vegetarians? Vegetarians?! Seriously?
- tdavis 18y ago
  You'd be surprised by the breadth of social classifications which scare the US Army. We still use "Fag" as a generalized insult. TIME WARP, BABY!
  - niels_olson 18y ago
    yeah, I have to admit, I grew up in Kansas and went straight into the military after high school. It has taken a long time to recognize and undo the damaged values they instill you with.
    - DanielBMarkham 18y ago
      All that duty, honor, country stuff? Keep working at recognizing the damage. They say admitting you have a problem is the first step.
      - tdavis 18y ago
        Do you love your Guns? Yeah! God? Yeah! The Government? Fuck Yeah!
- pasbesoin 18y ago
  Well, there's a plant in Japan that's apparently blogging. And the Swiss have recognized some set of plant rights. By that measure, vegetarians might be no better than murderers. In fact, their relentless focus on the exploitation of flora might even be viewed as a form of terrorism.
  - chrisbroadfoot 18y ago
    Vegetarians or vegetation?
- colinplamondon 18y ago
  heh, I also liked how the tacitly link 'human rights groups' to 'anarchists'.
  - DougBTX 18y ago
    Religious communities and atheists. Thou shalt be religious by yourself, otherwise: TERRORISTNAZIONTWITTER!!!
- njharman 18y ago
  They're not like us. So, you know we should be scared of and hate them. "Terrorists could theoretically use ..." What couldn't terrorists theoretically use? The next successful attack will use things they didn't think of. It's not like we had thought of crashing planes into skyscrapers. Oh wait, we did. This sort of "intel" is an utter waste. The signal to noise ratio sucks so bad it just gets ignored. Military and our leaders need actual information on what the opposition is doing, not theoretics. This is just security theater meant for internal military consumption.
axod 18y ago
Really. This should be on the onion. "Terrorists known to wear clothes to aid with their terrorism - Clothes are known to keep terrorists warm, helping them to kill innocent civilians. We should think very carefully about banning clothes all together" While we're at it, on a recent flight to the US I was asked "Where are you staying. You need to provide an address etc" (Security reasons apparently - I guess terrorists slip up there and reply "Oh I won't actually be landing... oops!"). I didn't have a clue of the address, I only know how to drive there. The guy checking me in just said "Ah don't worry, I'll put 'holiday inn, SFO'. Either security like that is important, or it's not. If it's not, get rid of it!
- bootload 18y ago
  "... "Where are you staying. You need to provide an address etc" (Security reasons apparently - I guess terrorists slip up there and reply "Oh I won't actually be landing... oops!") ..." Pretty standard questions to check to see if you are really doing what you say you are doing. Visiting? Business or holiday? Where are you staying? Got enough cash to cover that stay? The best thing to do is pre-book, take a print-out of where you are staying on your itinerary. Just doing their job - looking for travelers not sticking to their plan.
  - pasbesoin 18y ago
    Not to defend the theater aspect, but my (rather limited) understanding of effective security interview involves a series of questions and evaluation of performance across the responses. A single question by itself may not have much inherent meaning, but the composite can be quite effective. Can be. Not saying that's what they are doing in this instance.
    - bootload 18y ago
      "... effective security interview involves a series of questions and evaluation of performance across the responses ..." True. Add demeanor, body language, appearance to these questions. I think there a lot of non-verbal questions being asked by the person looking at visitors. One of the most useful is the ability to read"body language" and fit. Does this person fit the right pattern? Are they hiding something documentation and other procedures missed? Of course this will get a lot of false positives like the parent post.
deleted 18y ago
[deleted]
nir 18y ago
When they were using technologies like PGP there was reason for concern. When they start using stuff like Twitter I think it's great news for all of us non-terrorists.
- yters 18y ago
  I can has bom! lolz!1! Dudez, watch out for copperz!! they b readin ur twitter!
  - yters 18y ago
    I r serious hacker, this b serious thread.
time_management 18y ago
I worry more about Facebook status updates: Osama bin Laden's next attack will kill over 9000. Kefka Palazzo wonders what to do with these 3 statues Sarah Palin gave him. Kurt Godel just read the U.S. Constitution <ContradictionException @ #x1f3b7908> Ken Lay is tired of living in his girlfriend's basement. Faking your own death fucking sucks, man. Eric Cartman is going home.
niels_olson 18y ago
Better link: the Wired story, which actually provides a link to the FAS report: http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/10/terrorist-cell.html http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/10/terrorist-cell.html.
- jackowayed 18y ago
  UPDATE: Found the site. I feel stupid now. Here's the full text though: http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/mobile.pdf http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/mobile.pdf OLD: I found that, but I still can't find the full text of the report. It looks like all they have is a link to FAS's main site, so I'm currently digging through their site. If anyone has the link to the report, they'd be much appreciated.
sdurkin 18y ago
I'm more interested in microblogging as a battlefield awareness tool. Anyone know if someone's working on it?

16 points by ridertech 18y ago

"Twitter has also become a social activism tool for socialists, human rights groups, communists, vegetarians, anarchists, religious communities, atheists, political enthusiasts, hacktivists and others to communicate with each other and to send messages to broader audiences" Vegetarians? Vegetarians?! Seriously?

tdavis 18y ago
You'd be surprised by the breadth of social classifications which scare the US Army. We still use "Fag" as a generalized insult. TIME WARP, BABY!
- niels_olson 18y ago
  yeah, I have to admit, I grew up in Kansas and went straight into the military after high school. It has taken a long time to recognize and undo the damaged values they instill you with.
  - DanielBMarkham 18y ago
    All that duty, honor, country stuff? Keep working at recognizing the damage. They say admitting you have a problem is the first step.
    - tdavis 18y ago
      Do you love your Guns? Yeah! God? Yeah! The Government? Fuck Yeah!
pasbesoin 18y ago
Well, there's a plant in Japan that's apparently blogging. And the Swiss have recognized some set of plant rights. By that measure, vegetarians might be no better than murderers. In fact, their relentless focus on the exploitation of flora might even be viewed as a form of terrorism.
- chrisbroadfoot 18y ago
  Vegetarians or vegetation?
colinplamondon 18y ago
heh, I also liked how the tacitly link 'human rights groups' to 'anarchists'.
- DougBTX 18y ago
  Religious communities and atheists. Thou shalt be religious by yourself, otherwise: TERRORISTNAZIONTWITTER!!!
njharman 18y ago
They're not like us. So, you know we should be scared of and hate them. "Terrorists could theoretically use ..." What couldn't terrorists theoretically use? The next successful attack will use things they didn't think of. It's not like we had thought of crashing planes into skyscrapers. Oh wait, we did. This sort of "intel" is an utter waste. The signal to noise ratio sucks so bad it just gets ignored. Military and our leaders need actual information on what the opposition is doing, not theoretics. This is just security theater meant for internal military consumption.

axod 18y ago

Really. This should be on the onion. "Terrorists known to wear clothes to aid with their terrorism - Clothes are known to keep terrorists warm, helping them to kill innocent civilians. We should think very carefully about banning clothes all together" While we're at it, on a recent flight to the US I was asked "Where are you staying. You need to provide an address etc" (Security reasons apparently - I guess terrorists slip up there and reply "Oh I won't actually be landing... oops!"). I didn't have a clue of the address, I only know how to drive there. The guy checking me in just said "Ah don't worry, I'll put 'holiday inn, SFO'. Either security like that is important, or it's not. If it's not, get rid of it!

bootload 18y ago
"... "Where are you staying. You need to provide an address etc" (Security reasons apparently - I guess terrorists slip up there and reply "Oh I won't actually be landing... oops!") ..." Pretty standard questions to check to see if you are really doing what you say you are doing. Visiting? Business or holiday? Where are you staying? Got enough cash to cover that stay? The best thing to do is pre-book, take a print-out of where you are staying on your itinerary. Just doing their job - looking for travelers not sticking to their plan.
- pasbesoin 18y ago
  Not to defend the theater aspect, but my (rather limited) understanding of effective security interview involves a series of questions and evaluation of performance across the responses. A single question by itself may not have much inherent meaning, but the composite can be quite effective. Can be. Not saying that's what they are doing in this instance.
  - bootload 18y ago
    "... effective security interview involves a series of questions and evaluation of performance across the responses ..." True. Add demeanor, body language, appearance to these questions. I think there a lot of non-verbal questions being asked by the person looking at visitors. One of the most useful is the ability to read"body language" and fit. Does this person fit the right pattern? Are they hiding something documentation and other procedures missed? Of course this will get a lot of false positives like the parent post.

deleted 18y ago

[deleted]

nir 18y ago

When they were using technologies like PGP there was reason for concern. When they start using stuff like Twitter I think it's great news for all of us non-terrorists.

yters 18y ago
I can has bom! lolz!1! Dudez, watch out for copperz!! they b readin ur twitter!
- yters 18y ago
  I r serious hacker, this b serious thread.

time_management 18y ago

I worry more about Facebook status updates: Osama bin Laden's next attack will kill over 9000. Kefka Palazzo wonders what to do with these 3 statues Sarah Palin gave him. Kurt Godel just read the U.S. Constitution <ContradictionException @ #x1f3b7908> Ken Lay is tired of living in his girlfriend's basement. Faking your own death fucking sucks, man. Eric Cartman is going home.

niels_olson 18y ago

Better link: the Wired story, which actually provides a link to the FAS report: http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/10/terrorist-cell.html http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/10/terrorist-cell.html.

jackowayed 18y ago
UPDATE: Found the site. I feel stupid now. Here's the full text though: http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/mobile.pdf http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/mobile.pdf OLD: I found that, but I still can't find the full text of the report. It looks like all they have is a link to FAS's main site, so I'm currently digging through their site. If anyone has the link to the report, they'd be much appreciated.

sdurkin 18y ago

I'm more interested in microblogging as a battlefield awareness tool. Anyone know if someone's working on it?