TWoP, Twitter, and the SEC: A Federal Investigation of Musk’s “Conduct” with the TSX Co-Owner
While it’s not clear who may be carrying out the probe or what actions Musk may be investigated for, TWoP did say that US officials may be investigating. Twitter’s filing merely said authorities are looking into Musk’s “conduct” linked to the deal.
The company accused the legal team of failing to produce draft communications with the Securities and Exchange Commission, as well as a slide presentation to theFederal Trade Commission, in their ongoing litigation over whether Musk can walk away from the deal.
That’s all been publicly known and widely reported on over the past two years. The material shared by Musk paints a more vivid picture of the scramble inside Twitter to figure out what to do – but does not fundamentally alter that picture.
The company was purchased by Musk for $54.20 per share but last week he proposed to buy it again for $55 per share. The judge overseeing the dispute later in the week ruled to pause the legal proceedings until Oct. 28 following a request from Musk.
“Twitter’s executives are under federal investigation,” Spiro said in a statement to CNN. “This misdirection was sent by Twitter to try and uncover which of their assorted misconduct they are under investigation for.”
According to the filing,Twitter did not demand that Zatko torch his own documents. Zatko had notebooks, but no idea what information they contained.
Using cloud email hosting to exploit state-sponsored fake news: a study of the vice society custodians of the encyclopedia
As the war in Ukraine drags on, the Ukrainian forces have demonstrated resilience by mounting increasingly intense attacks on Kremlin forces. But as the conflict evolves, it is entering an ominous phase of drone warfare. Russia has begun launching a series of recent attacks using Iranian “suicide drones” to inflict damage that is difficult to defend against. NATO officials watch for signs of movement in Russia to assess whether it is preparing to use nuclear weapons, as Russian President Putin increases his rhetoric about a potential nuclear strike.
The platform isn’t getting enough development resources anymore and customers should seriously consider migrate to cloud email hosting if they still want to use it. The research looks at how the custodians of the encyclopedia ferret out state-sponsored fake news.
The notorious gang the Vice Society maximized profits and minimized their exposure by investing very little in technical innovation according to research findings this week. Instead, they simply run the most sparse and unremarkable operations they can to target under-funded sectors like health care and education. We’ve got 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 to 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 to 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299
But wait, there’s more! We highlight the news we didn’t cover in-depth. Click on the headline to read the full story. And stay safe out there.
Source: https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-bytedance-americans-data-security-roundup/
The US-based social video platform TikTok reveals an internal audit and risk control plan to target the location of a US citizen
The United States has been warned of a potential national security danger because the popular social video platform, TikTok, is owned by a Chinese company. But TikTok has always maintained that it is firewalled between ByteDance and its US userbase. But materials seen by Forbes indicate that an internal ByteDance review board, the “Internal Audit and Risk Control department,” planned to direct TikTok to track the location of some specific US users. The group typically focuses on internal, employee issues, but the US-based individuals were reportedly not affiliated with TikTok or ByteDance. “In at least two cases, the Internal Audit team also planned to collect TikTok data about the location of a US citizen who had never had an employment relationship with the company, the materials show. It’s not clear whether data about this group of Americans was actually collected.
Microsoft said this week that a misconfiguration exposed the data of some prospective customers of its cloud services. Researchers from the threats intelligence firm SOCRadar disclosed the leak to Microsoft on September 24, and the exposure was quickly closed. SOCRadar said in a report that the exposed information stretched back to as far as 2017 and up to August of this year. The researchers compared the data to more than 67,000 organizations. Microsoft said the information it exposed included names, company names, phone numbers, email addresses and files sent between potential customers and Microsoft or one of its authorized partners. Cloud misconfigurations are a longstanding security risk that can lead to many exposures.
Source: https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-bytedance-americans-data-security-roundup/
The United States is Moving Forward on the Internet of Things: Security Labels for Internet-connected Devices as Energy Stars for Digital Security and Information Security
There are no easy answers to improve the longstanding security dumpster fire created by cheap, undefended internet of things devices in homes and businesses around the world. But after years of problems, countries like Singapore and Germany have found that adding security labels to internet-connected video cameras, printers, toothbrushes, and more. The labels give consumers a better understanding of the protections built into different devices, and give manufacturers an incentive to improve their practices and get a gold seal. The United States took a step in this direction this week. The White House announced plans for a labeling scheme that would be a sort of EnergyStar for IoT digital security. The administration held a summit with industry organizations and companies this week to discuss standards and guidelines for the labels. “A labeling program to secure such devices would provide American consumers with the peace of mind that the technology being brought into their homes is safe, and incentivize manufacturers to meet higher cybersecurity standards, and retailers to market secure devices,” National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement.
Sources told The Washington Post this week that sensitive information related to Iran‘s nuclear program and the United States’ own intelligence operations in China were included in documents seized by the FBI this summer at former President Trump‘s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. There are risks to unauthorized disclosures in the documents, experts say. The Post wrote about how people aiding US intelligence efforts could be in danger. The US could potentially be retaliated against by other countries.
In the past week alone, one of the world’s most influential social networks has laid off half its workforce; alienated powerful advertisers; blown up key aspects of its product, then repeatedly launched and un-launched other features aimed at compensating for it; and witnessed an exodus of senior executives.
The one thing Musk claims is going in his favor at Twitter is user growth, as more people tune in to watch him fumble his way through owning the company.
It’s a stunning reversal of fortunes not just for Musk, who bought the company for $44 billion, but also for a platform used by some of the most powerful people on the planet, including world leaders, CEOs, and the Pope.
“We’re not currently putting an ‘Official’ label on accounts but we are aggressively going after impersonation and deception,” Twitter’s verified support account tweeted on Wednesday evening.
That paid subscription service, too, was also suspended on Friday with little warning, just two days after its official launch, with the menu option to sign up for Twitter Blue suddenly disappearing from Twitter’s iOS app — the only place the add-on had been offered. It was not immediately clear when the company might restore the offering.
The Twitter Blue: Corporate Social Responsibility, Product Safety, and Information Security in the Light of Musk’s Breakdown of the Paid Verification Feature
The rocky introduction of the paid verification feature led misinformation experts to warn that the feature would make it more difficult to find reliable information following the US midterm elections. Even some of Musk’s fellow high-powered users of the platform had tough feedback.
“@elonmusk, from one entrepreneur to another, for when you have your customer service hat on. Mark Cuban said he spent too much time muting his verified mentions in order to make them useful again.
Cuban added that there is a decision to be made. “Stick with the new Twitter that democratizes every tweet by paid accounts and puts the onus on all users to curate for themselves. Or bring back Twitter curation. One makes Twitter time and information efficient. The other is not good at all.
Musk had an event for advertisers this week where he pleaded with brands to keep using the platform after a growing number of companies paused ads. Musk looked to appear magnanimous in admitting responsibility for the company’s performance.
According to an internal Slack message posted by a Twitter employee and viewed by CNN, Musk has shown little fear of the FTC regulators overseeing the company’s multiple, legally binding consent agreements committing it to maintaining a robust cybersecurity program and producing written privacy impact reports before launching any new products or services, a requirement that could cover Twitter Blue.
Over the weekend, Musk smeared Twitter’s former head of safety, Yoel Roth, who features prominently in the documents, with homophobic tropes common in anti-LGBTQ conspiracy theories. Musk had attacked Fauci, who Musk says will be part of future installments of the Twitter files, and he amplified a conspiracy theory about the COVID-19 pandemic.
They’re a collection of internal emails and Slack chats capturing Twitter employees discussing company policies and fraught moderation calls. So far they’ve covered the decision to ban Trump, Twitter’s short-lived decision to block a news story in October 2020 drawn from material on Hunter Biden’s laptop, and how the company limits the reach of accounts that break its rules, including some well-known right-wing users.
Major news outlets were unable to corroborate the contents of a laptop identified as possibly Russian interference and held off on reporting the story. Twitter went a step further, temporarily forbidding its users from sharing the Post story, even in their DMs.
The revelations include the bureau allegedly pressuring Twitter to moderate content and corresponding with it to identify alleged foreign influence and election tampering “of all kinds.”
“The Twitter Files confirm Q’s entire main narrative,” one QAnon influencer wrote. Balenciaga confirms the rest. That message, which references the fantastical claims about fashion brand Balenciaga’s role in child trafficking, was seen more than 120,000 times on Telegram. Despite some optimism that his account would be restored, it is still suspended on the micro-blogging site. Jack Dorsey, the former head of the social networking site, used a custom top-level domain for his personal email, which other influencer seized on.
The Story of Elon Musk Revisited: News Stories from the Early Trump Era Revealed in the Reliable Sources Daily Digest
The ongoing stories are being treated as the next Pentagon Papers by the right-wing media machine, and they are hyping each new revelation as proof of the horrors of power.
The first version of this article appeared in theReliable Sources newsletter. Sign up for the daily digest chronicling the evolving media landscape here.
The conservative former top editor of The Wall Street Journal wrote Monday that there was no new information he could find in the Twitter Files. There’s no shocking revelation in there about government censorship or covert manipulation by political campaigns. They just bring to the surface the internal discussions of a company dealing with complex issues in a way that is consistent with its values.
The downside to avoiding the fiasco is that it will allow the saga to be defined by dishonest actors in right-wing media. When I searched Google for the term “Twitter Files,” the three top stories on Monday were from Fox News, the New York Post, and the Washington Examiner. The right is flooding the zone with a warped interpretation of each new release while the rest of the press turns a blind eye toward each installment.
It can be hard to understand what is going on if you are just a regular person. The solution isn’t clear. On the other side, if newsrooms wrote about each story, they might give air to a storyline that has been framed by Musk as he wages a information war. He can define it in the public square if he doesn’t analyze each drop.
Eventually, many (if not all) news outlets kicked (if not entirely) the habit of amplifying every wild tweet and got back to doing their real job, which was to report on what Trump’s administration was actually doing—much of which he himself may have been, at best, only dimly aware of. Over the past few weeks, though, news habits from the early Trump years have resurfaced around Elon Musk.
Here, for instance, we saw a slew of rapid-response news stories about Musk’s tweet on December 11 that “My pronouns are Prosecute/Fauci,” a dig at the government’s former chief infectious disease expert, as well as at gender diversity. Here’s another bunch about the picture of his bedside table with two replica guns on it, and some more about his tweeting a far-right Pepe the Frog meme.
This is how the coverage of Trump was done. The right-wing media treated his apparent egomania and lack of interest in grasping basic policies as evidence that he was not fit to be president, while the liberal media was drawn to stories about his ability to bring himself down in flames. There was some good reporting going on, but these accounts often dominated the conversation. The public lost understanding of what was happening across the country because of incompatible narratives surrounding the behavior of a man in the White House.
This is what is happening with Musk. The relationship between the new owner and the journalists who cover him is described by the Atlantic as a ‘dysfunctional’ one, where the least defensible statements and claims on both sides are relentlessly amplified in a never ending cycle.
He’s restored thousands of accounts that were banned for violating the rules, including Trump, neo-Nazis, white nationalists and QanonPromoters, but won’t allow Alex Jones, who has been vocally antisemitic. How that squares with Musk’s purported embrace of free speech principles is unclear.
Musk teased a bombshell in popcorn-filled messages, but he missed out on an opportunity to shine a light on how content moderation is made.
First and foremost, Musk has only allowed two journalists he chose access to the files, conservative columnist Bari Weiss and Matt Taibbi, a former Rolling Stone writer who now has a newsletter on Substack. But when other media outlets sought access to the files, no copies of the documents were forthcoming. There is no way to ensure that the documents are complete or that key information is not held back.
But many tech journalists, social media experts and former Twitter employees say Musk’s claims are over-hyped, given that the documents shared so far largely corroborate what is already known about the messy business of policing a large social network.
“What is really coming through in the Twitter Files for me is: people who are confronting high-stakes, unanticipated events and trying to figure out what policies apply and how,” said Renée DiResta, research manager at the Stanford Internet Observatory, who studies how narratives spread on social networks.
They show Twitter executives and rank and file employees grappling with difficult tradeoffs, questioning the company’s rules and how they should be applied – and in some cases, getting things wrong.
The New York Post story detailing the dealings of the son of former Vice President Joe Biden were briefly blocked from being read on the social media network right before the 2020 election.
Citing its rules against sharing hacked material containing private information, the company showed a warning to anyone who tried to post a link to the article saying it was “potentially harmful.” The New York Post’s own account was suspended until it deleted its comments related to the story. (Facebook was alarmed by the article, too, but didn’t go as far as Twitter. The link to the posts could be posted, but there was only limited distribution of the posts while the fact-checkers looked at the claims.
There was no evidence that the New York Post story was blocked because of government help, despite assertions by Musk and others.
“I continue to believe there was no ill intent or hidden agendas, and everyone acted according to the best information we had at the time,” he wrote. “Mistakes were made.”
He said he wished the internal files had been released with more attention and scrutiny. He said: “There’s a lot to learn from.”
What do we need to understand when we’re talking about Trump and the social media industry? The case of Twitter, Caulfield, and DiResta
DiResta said that there’s good reason to demand more information about how social media companies operate. “Often these decisions are quite inscrutable,” she said. The question of how they’re moderated and how they’re designed are crucial to the shape of public opinion.
But she said to get the full picture, outsiders need more than the “anecdotes” Musk’s selected journalists are sharing – which, so far, focus exclusively on charged, highly partisan American political dramas.
She said it would be helpful to see conversations around the accounts of other leaders who were not kicked off the platform to better understand the decision to ban Trump.
“There’s value in what’s been revealed to the public, but at the same time, it is primarily reinforcing a perception in large part based on your pre-existing opinions as partisan individuals within the United States,” DiResta said.
Framing the disclosures as secret knowledge plays particularly well on Twitter, said Mike Caulfield, a research scientist at the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public.
He made violent threats against both men. Roth and his family have been forced to flee their home, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The current attacks against my former colleagues are not going to solve anything, and could be dangerous. “If you want to blame, direct it at me and my actions, or lack thereof.”
He has made deep cuts to the company’s trust and safety workforce, including teams focused on non-English languages and state-backed propaganda operations. Some of their members came under online attack after Musk criticized them, which led to the dissolution of the Trust and Safety Council.
A Trust and Safety Council member who is concerned of being retaliated against said that the CEO’s willingness to target people who work to keep the platform’s users safe is creating a chilling effect.
“It is being processed as punitive and sort of owning the last regime, as opposed to saying, ‘Here are things that we can see in these files and here is how it’s going to be done differently under our watch,'” DiResta said.
The Dean Obeidallah Show: The FBI’s Own Ministry of Propaganda after the 2016 U.S. Senate Elections
Editor’s Note: Dean Obeidallah, a former attorney, is the host of SiriusXM radio’s daily program “The Dean Obeidallah Show.” Follow him @DeanObeidallah@masto.ai. His own opinions are expressed in this commentary. View more opinion on CNN.
James Comer of Kentucky told Fox News that the FBI should be dismantled in order to respond to the documents known as the Twitter Files.
Meanwhile, Rep. Ted Lieu of California — recently elected vice chair of the House Democratic Caucus — slammed one of the journalists that Musk picked to share the files, disputing the allegation that the FBI had stopped investigating “child sex predators or terrorists” to focus on a “surveillance operation” of people using the platform.
It’s unclear what the relationship is between these two journalists and Musk in terms of editorial freedom. Taibbi told me Sunday morning via a Twitter direct message that “I do not work for Musk in any way, shape, or form.”
Congress should subpoena a complete set of the so-called “Twitter Files,” as well as compel past and current chiefs of the social media site to testify under oath.
Beyond that, the FBI’s leadership should testify after this fact-finding has been completed. The bureau should welcome this opportunity, given the smears by certain GOP lawmakers such as Comer that “the FBI had its own ministry of propaganda.”
For starters, in the run-up to the 2020 election, representatives of the FBI, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Homeland Security met with social media giants such as Twitter to discuss threats posed by foreign actors to influence our elections.
But why did officials from then-President Donald Trump’s own administration raise concerns about a state actor’s possible release of misinformation about then-candidate Joe Biden’s son, Hunter?
Beyond that, Taibbi alleges that the FBI began flagging certain Twitter accounts because of their content, starting in January 2020 — again under the Trump administration.
Per Taibbi, the requests continued through last month and targeted people on both the right and left, including actor and progressive activist Billy Baldwin, the brother of Alec Baldwin — whom Trump had long attacked over the actor’s impersonation of him on “Saturday Night Live.”
The then-President tweeted that the Federal Communications Commission should investigate “SNL” and even asked whether the Justice Department could do the same, The Daily Beast reported.
In the end, the bureau may simply be protecting our nation from threats — as it should. Or Musk could be trying to attract more users on the right by going after the FBI, given that some celebrities and others have left the platform since he took over in late October. There could be something going on with the FBI.