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> “Misinformation, they realized, could be treated the same way: as a cybersecurity problem.” It is, when spread over the internet in a systematic and intentio

> “Misinformation, they realized, could be treated the same way: as a cybersecurity problem.” It is, when spread over the internet in a systematic and intentional way. It literally is social engineering. There is a serious problem with misinformation causing radicalization and SV is doing only the bare minimum to give congress lip service, and it is getting measurably worse. Malicious regimes around the world are fueling these efforts systematically and intentionally (e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Research_Agency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Research_Agency) and know that this is a cheap way to cause domestic problems within the US at an arms length. From their perspective, this is a great weapon, and a trojan horse taking advantage of the US's cultural reluctance to censor. Many here usually support a "no censorship in any circumstance" position, but I think that's a dangerous position to take in this situation, because it risks a future in which speech is free but automatically distrusted. Something needs to be done to cut these efforts off at the source before it (further) undermines our own trust in free speech.

Amezarak 3y ago
I personally believe misinformation is a symptom rather than a cause of radicalization, but granting the premise, I don’t see how SV and USGOV can be trusted to fairly censor and run their own propaganda campaigns without transparency. We already have examples of them abusing this power.
- kube-system 3y ago
  There's a complex web of how disinformation and misinformation interact. Misinformation spread by ignorant people to other ignorant people is bad, but I don't think it's really the problem here, and I don't think it should necessarily be censored. The real problem is the engineered disinformation which is introduced into the wild by malicious parties for the purpose of causing political unrest. The downstream people who latch on to these made up ideas then become unwitting amplifiers and/or people who decide to act in real life (e.g. David DePape). They're the victims of these social engineering attacks. Really, it's not much different than how malware spreads. It's just malware for social engineering.
  - Amezarak 3y ago
    Call it what you will: I mean people in a free and fair healthy society cannot be radicalized by information. It can only happen when bad government and other organic social forces (which government could regulate with better policy) cause a material decline in people’s living circumstances. Weimar Germany had Nazis and Communists agitating and spreading disinformation for years. They did what they could to suppress and censor them both, instead of addressing the underlying causes that ultimately led to the complete social bankruptcy of the government and its takeover by the Nazis - but if it hadn’t been them it’d have been another extremist group. It wasn’t the ideology that created the extremism. It was the failed society. Censorship only accelerates the decline by further reducing the legitimacy of the government.
    - kube-system 3y ago
      > I mean people in a free and fair healthy society cannot be radicalized by information. It can only happen when bad government and other organic social forces (which government could regulate with better policy) cause a material decline in people’s living circumstances. That's just not true, and there are radical minds in every country on the planet. The young, uneducated, mentally ill, disabled, or other vulnerably impressionable minds are absolutely capable of being radicalized by falsehoods that target their insecurities or vulnerabilities. > Censorship only accelerates the decline by further reducing the legitimacy of the government. The government doesn't have to do the censoring. In the age of centralized media, media outlets "self-censored" (e.g. editing and fact checking), and were significantly more trusted by the public than any media outlets are today. The lost of trust in today's world is squarely to blame on social media platforms, who republish literal falsehoods and throw their hands up and say "section 230!" as they cash their ad checks. 100 years from now, this will be seen as the defining moral hazard of this century.
altruios 3y ago
maybe we just need a better system to measure 'trusted speech'? Censorship is a tool, but when all you have is one tool... well... We need better tools, not more censorship!
- kube-system 3y ago
  The problem is that there's only one ultimate system that the public uses to measure trusted speech: individual human judgement of trust. Many have tried to create other trusted systems, but they all have a weakness in that they, themselves, are subordinate to that. This problem can't be fixed with technology because it is not a technology problem, it's a human problem.
  - altruios 3y ago
    I don't disagree it's a human problem... But at the same time... There's the idea of a giftschrank around 'dangerous / false' information... That is a tool to combat the spread of information deemed dangerous, without censorship... So is the lesson then: just add meta-data to everything?
jruohonen 3y ago
> It is, when spread over the internet in a systematic and intentional way. It literally is social engineering. I tend to agree. Yet, the problem here, I think, is that like all people with a technical background, cyber security people are ill-suited to handle the issue; you really need those "damned" social scientists and humanists to understand the context and societal implications, such as: > There is a serious problem with misinformation causing radicalization and SV is doing only the bare minimum to give congress lip service, and it is getting measurably worse. Another big problem, as I've argued here before, is the securitization that comes with cyber security people and these "misinfosec" things or whatever you want to call them.

Amezarak 3y ago

I personally believe misinformation is a symptom rather than a cause of radicalization, but granting the premise, I don’t see how SV and USGOV can be trusted to fairly censor and run their own propaganda campaigns without transparency. We already have examples of them abusing this power.

kube-system 3y ago
There's a complex web of how disinformation and misinformation interact. Misinformation spread by ignorant people to other ignorant people is bad, but I don't think it's really the problem here, and I don't think it should necessarily be censored. The real problem is the engineered disinformation which is introduced into the wild by malicious parties for the purpose of causing political unrest. The downstream people who latch on to these made up ideas then become unwitting amplifiers and/or people who decide to act in real life (e.g. David DePape). They're the victims of these social engineering attacks. Really, it's not much different than how malware spreads. It's just malware for social engineering.
- Amezarak 3y ago
  Call it what you will: I mean people in a free and fair healthy society cannot be radicalized by information. It can only happen when bad government and other organic social forces (which government could regulate with better policy) cause a material decline in people’s living circumstances. Weimar Germany had Nazis and Communists agitating and spreading disinformation for years. They did what they could to suppress and censor them both, instead of addressing the underlying causes that ultimately led to the complete social bankruptcy of the government and its takeover by the Nazis - but if it hadn’t been them it’d have been another extremist group. It wasn’t the ideology that created the extremism. It was the failed society. Censorship only accelerates the decline by further reducing the legitimacy of the government.
  - kube-system 3y ago
    > I mean people in a free and fair healthy society cannot be radicalized by information. It can only happen when bad government and other organic social forces (which government could regulate with better policy) cause a material decline in people’s living circumstances. That's just not true, and there are radical minds in every country on the planet. The young, uneducated, mentally ill, disabled, or other vulnerably impressionable minds are absolutely capable of being radicalized by falsehoods that target their insecurities or vulnerabilities. > Censorship only accelerates the decline by further reducing the legitimacy of the government. The government doesn't have to do the censoring. In the age of centralized media, media outlets "self-censored" (e.g. editing and fact checking), and were significantly more trusted by the public than any media outlets are today. The lost of trust in today's world is squarely to blame on social media platforms, who republish literal falsehoods and throw their hands up and say "section 230!" as they cash their ad checks. 100 years from now, this will be seen as the defining moral hazard of this century.

altruios 3y ago

maybe we just need a better system to measure 'trusted speech'? Censorship is a tool, but when all you have is one tool... well... We need better tools, not more censorship!

kube-system 3y ago
The problem is that there's only one ultimate system that the public uses to measure trusted speech: individual human judgement of trust. Many have tried to create other trusted systems, but they all have a weakness in that they, themselves, are subordinate to that. This problem can't be fixed with technology because it is not a technology problem, it's a human problem.
- altruios 3y ago
  I don't disagree it's a human problem... But at the same time... There's the idea of a giftschrank around 'dangerous / false' information... That is a tool to combat the spread of information deemed dangerous, without censorship... So is the lesson then: just add meta-data to everything?

jruohonen 3y ago

> It is, when spread over the internet in a systematic and intentional way. It literally is social engineering. I tend to agree. Yet, the problem here, I think, is that like all people with a technical background, cyber security people are ill-suited to handle the issue; you really need those "damned" social scientists and humanists to understand the context and societal implications, such as: > There is a serious problem with misinformation causing radicalization and SV is doing only the bare minimum to give congress lip service, and it is getting measurably worse. Another big problem, as I've argued here before, is the securitization that comes with cyber security people and these "misinfosec" things or whatever you want to call them.