[HN Gopher] 70TB of Parler users' messages, videos, and posts le...
___________________________________________________________________
70TB of Parler users' messages, videos, and posts leaked by
security researchers
Author : joiguru
Score : 803 points
Date : 2021-01-11 14:18 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (cybernews.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (cybernews.com)
| mellosouls wrote:
| "researchers".
|
| Imagine what they'd be called if this was Reddit, Twitter or a
| non-conservative site they'd hacked.
| NicoJuicy wrote:
| I crawled reddit in several topics.
|
| It's supported through their api.
| akhilcacharya wrote:
| You can literally download Reddit and Twitter archives anytime
| you want.
| surge wrote:
| No, you can't. There are private tweets, profiles, DMs and
| deleted messages/posts/tweets and for sure the profile data.
| This isn't a scrape of the site using a regular account, this
| is cracking admin accounts, creating their own admin accounts
| and using it to scrape private accounts, DMs, user
| information, and deleted content.
| judge2020 wrote:
| https://github.com/ArchiveTeam/parler-grab
|
| The details in the post are generally false - nowhere in
| this grabber (which is what was used to download the 70TB
| (or 56tb based on the tracker[0]) are admin credentials
| used to bypass access controls. There were no ACLs on the
| video and picture files, so anyone could wget them without
| issue.
|
| 0: https://tracker.archiveteam.org/parler/
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Someone went to prison for wget'ing ATT data. And people
| right here argued that when you create a script to do so,
| you're no longer using their intended functionality in
| good faith.
| judge2020 wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24876481
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| I was talking about weev, not Aaron.
| [deleted]
| Triv888 wrote:
| terrorists of course
| pnw_hazor wrote:
| Imagine if they published a portion of the contents of a laptop
| they legally owned.
| nether wrote:
| We don't have to imagine. The other side is calling them "left
| extremists":
| https://mobile.twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1348484125825658...
| QuesnayJr wrote:
| The hack is equivalent to if someone downloaded all of the
| content of Reddit, or a database of all tweets, if this post is
| to be believed: https://www.reddit.com/r/ParlerWatch/comments/k
| v0jo6/psa_the.... Would anyone even bat an eye if that
| happened?
| SamBam wrote:
| From the original article
|
| > This may include things from deleted/private posts.
|
| I think people would be alarmed if private DMs were leaked
| from Twitter, yes.
|
| The data also includes the geolocations of posters.[1]
|
| Another comment also suggested that the photos of the
| driver's licenses that were used to verify users were also
| being downloaded, though I'm not certain if this is true.
|
| 1. https://gizmodo.com/every-deleted-parler-post-many-with-
| user...
| Miner49er wrote:
| Yeah, but this apparently was all downloaded through
| Parler's publically accessible API, so if anyone should be
| to blame here, it is Parler.
| pelasaco wrote:
| interesting opinion from Glenn Greenwald:
|
| "Do you know how many of the people arrested in connection with
| the Capitol invasion were active users of Parler?
|
| Zero.
|
| The planning was largely done on Facebook. This is all a bullshit
| pretext for silencing competitors on ideological grounds: just
| the start."
|
| https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1348619731734028293
| mplewis wrote:
| Good ol' Glenn Greenwald, always stepping up to defend fascists
| pelasaco wrote:
| What? Could you please explain your point of view?
| ashudeep wrote:
| Now the NLP researchers can study how influence through language
| works in the far right groups. This will give a good enough
| strategy for other social media and knowledge to us as a society
| to not fall prey to such traps in the future.
| diveanon wrote:
| I mean let's call it what it is, a hack and dox.
|
| That being said, doing to lords work. Expose this cancer so it
| can be removed.
| x86_64Ubuntu wrote:
| I've always been amazed at how hackers can exfiltrate so much
| data with no one even batting an eye. Doing the math, the pure
| data cost to Parler was $7,700
|
| (($0.15/GB _10) + ($0.11 /GB _ 40) + ($0.09/GB _20))_ 1000 = >
| $7,700
|
| https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/aws-data-transfer-prices-re...
|
| Even the Chase Bank hack had an astronomical amount of data that
| didn't appear to set off any alarms.
| hehehaha wrote:
| This so much. Are they not using dashboards? This amount of
| traffic should have triggered multiple alarms. Makes me think
| their devs just stopped caring.
| MrMan wrote:
| maybe the devs are doing free speech activites and not
| watching the dashboard. I know I am being distracted from
| work by the activity here
| nrmitchi wrote:
| According to reports, their monthly AWS spend (prior to today,
| obviously) was ~300k (or 3.6M/year).
|
| 7.7k is not really a noticeable increase, and any alarms that
| _did_ trigger would likely have been attributed to increased
| user growth and platform load.
|
| That is if someone was even seeing a billing alarm alerting
| with every other issue that was going on.
| curiousllama wrote:
| I've seen more than one company that had a cloud spend policy
| that boiled down to: "if you spend a lot, the finance guy is
| gonna send you a snarky email a week later"
|
| Totally not surprised they didn't catch a 7.7k spike in real
| time
| runlevel1 wrote:
| At a certain scale it can be difficult to distinguish between
| data exfiltration and normal spikes in legitimate traffic.
| mxcrossb wrote:
| Of course, being unaware of how much you're being charged is
| par for the course with AWS!
| josh_frome wrote:
| Best they can do is eventual consistency for billing,
| apparently.
| wilde wrote:
| To be fair, there's a story on here every week about how cloud
| provider alarms are happy to ping you 24h after the spend.
| mzs wrote:
| >the lack of moderation on Parler is not the issue. they actually
| have very robust moderation tools and all new users start out
| shadowbanned until enough of their post get approved for
| rightthink by their user moderators
|
| https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1347939939120533506
|
| >This is not an ad network. This is a system where their most
| "influential" users can get paid to post organic-looking
| sponsored content. Their CEO talks about it...
|
| https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1346565749977051136
| willejs wrote:
| This wasn't leaked, it was archived from public sources.
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25727025
| willejs wrote:
| See original author clarifying this wasnt a leak or a hack.
| https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1348666166978424832
| nip180 wrote:
| When I read that the FBI was asking for help in identifying
| people at the capital on January 6th I didn't think someone would
| actually help.
| andromeduck wrote:
| If you think that's funny, someone made a post asking for
| people's names, locations and list of crimes so that they could
| be pardoned and people obliged.
|
| https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/jan/10/social-medi...
| nip180 wrote:
| The low hanging fruit of social engineering.
| [deleted]
| samuelizdat wrote:
| Not a serious country
| imwillofficial wrote:
| This title is misleading. Leaking private data of users after
| accessing it illegally is not "security research", its criminal
| hacking.
| bArray wrote:
| > Parler, a social network used to plan the storming of the
|
| > U.S. Capitol last week [..]
|
| I thought "huh, never heard that before" - checked the source [1]
| and it's essentially some people working at DRFLab speculating
| that it _may_ have been the case. So not off to a great start.
|
| The links appear down to me, but if I remember correctly these
| were a series of links to Parler - which the website is now down
| due to AWS. So the "leaks" can no longer be downloaded. I also
| believe that the links were essentially all just public material
| from what I could find...
|
| [1] https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/content-
| series/fastthinking/...
| king_magic wrote:
| Well, if nothing else, glad to see there is a paper trail to
| track down the terrorists who plotted and took part in last
| week's insurrection.
| liminal wrote:
| I see a number of people here describing Parler as "unmoderated",
| but it turns out they do have extensive moderation [1] that they
| use to ensure ideological conformity in their posts. Then the
| most active users were paid for their content too [2]. This
| really makes it more of a propaganda weapon than a free speech
| platform.
|
| [1] https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1347939939120533506 [2]
| https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1346565749977051136
| pelasaco wrote:
| I didn't know Parler before. I'm not American, and I'm
| definitely not a right-wing supporter. But that's not the same
| as Youtube/Facebook/Spotify tries to do? Good for ads and
| supporting their political agenda?
|
| References:
|
| - https://medium.com/swlh/youtube-algorithm-rigged-
| breadtube-e...
|
| - https://theindustryobserver.thebrag.com/spotify-joe-rogan/
|
| EDIT:
|
| Wow: So many down-votes in less than a minute, without any
| comment.
|
| interesting opinion from Glenn Greenwald:
|
| "Do you know how many of the people arrested in connection with
| the Capitol invasion were active users of Parler?
|
| Zero.
|
| The planning was largely done on Facebook. This is all a
| bullshit pretext for silencing competitors on ideological
| grounds: just the start."
|
| https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1348619731734028293
| tda wrote:
| His statements are not backed by any evidence, so I don't
| know what to make of them. Nonetheless an interesting opinion
| by someone that has done some great things that certainly
| tickeled my curiosity, +1
| KingOfCoders wrote:
| Mr Greenwald is an activist.
| pelasaco wrote:
| everyone in some level is an activist.
|
| I don't agree with everything that he does or says.
| However I'm sure he would be the last one to take the
| side of Parler or any other similar project.
| pelasaco wrote:
| I'm not really following the issue, but there is any
| evidence of the people involved in the Capitol invasion
| being active users on Parler?
| ErikVandeWater wrote:
| I don't see in either of those threads evidence that the
| moderation is one-sided.
|
| And a social media company paying the users that create the
| most content? Dastardly!
| trianglem wrote:
| The most _murderous_ content, yay!
| Reedx wrote:
| > but it turns out they do have extensive moderation [1] that
| they use to ensure ideological conformity
|
| Am I missing something? What are you referring to exactly? The
| mod tools screenshot doesn't support that assertion.
| hertzrat wrote:
| Agreed. Maybe the problem is that everyone uses badly
| organized and ambiguous Twitter threads as citation sources
| lately. It's not a good platform for that, you literally
| don't have the character counts to explain something
| Barrin92 wrote:
| it's not surprising given that it's Mercer funded who basically
| make the Koch's look harmless.
|
| People shouldn't be fooled and take this notion of 'free-
| speech' that is being advocated by these platforms at face
| value. They're not about genuine free exchange, they're funded
| by and organised by very well networked organisations who use
| them to further extremist political causes.
| specialist wrote:
| Libertarian vs neoreactionary.
|
| Whereas the Kochs want to be in charge of government, the
| Mercers want to eliminate government.
| ardy42 wrote:
| > This really makes it more of a propaganda weapon than a free
| speech platform.
|
| Which is not surprising, given how the term free speech is
| getting twisted these days. It seems the term is now used more
| often to whine about others who don't want to disseminate a
| faction's lies (without comment!) than to actually argue for
| the free exchange of ideas in good faith.
| hertzrat wrote:
| It's not that what you said is untrue, but those posts are just
| screenshots of moderation and reward tools, not necessarily
| ideological conformity tools. It reminds me of quora [1] and
| some other sites that used to pay too posters as a way of
| driving site-wide engagement (sort of a way to buy users to get
| network effects going, like Uber eats offering free deliveries
| during Covid to get more users)
|
| [1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18742484
| jhowell wrote:
| > It's not that what you said is untrue, but those posts are
| just screenshots of moderation and reward tools, not
| necessarily ideological conformity tools.
|
| What do ideological conformity tools look like to you?
| tomp wrote:
| Based on the screenshot you linked to, their "moderation"
| categories are "spam", "ads", "impersonation", "defamation",
| "nudity", "pornography", "illegal", "terrorism", "trademark"
| and "threat".
|
| Can you please explain how they use that to "ensure ideological
| conformity in their posts"?
| andromeduck wrote:
| Is there a legal reason to have defamation up there? It seems
| like a pretty funny one to have for a free speech platform -
| the others are more understandable.
| klyrs wrote:
| Defamation is not free speech, it's illegal.
| andromeduck wrote:
| So it's just there to cover bases then? It's basically
| impossible to win a defamation case when the subject is a
| public person no?
| boomboomsubban wrote:
| A public person needs to prove it was malicious and
| caused damages, but the rule is likely to prevent
| harassment of private people on the platform.
| liminal wrote:
| In the tweet text it says "all new users start out
| shadowbanned until enough of their post get approved for
| rightthink by their user moderators"
| notJim wrote:
| Did they provide any evidence of that, or was it just
| editorializing? It's not uncommon for new users to start
| out with limited privileges on some platforms for spam and
| fraud prevention reasons.
| liminal wrote:
| It might just be editorializing. Perhaps the community is
| self-selecting enough that censorship isn't needed.
| Regardless, it's not "moderation-free"
| hertzrat wrote:
| Hackernews starts you off shadowbanned too. It's a way to
| ward off spammers and bots. I know because this account
| started off shadow banned for 1-2 weeks until I had made
| 5-10 posts. Edit: Why in earth is this getting downvoted so
| heavily? Every new account everyone I know ever made was
| shadow banned at first
| deadmetheny wrote:
| Because it's wrong, new accounts absolutely do not get
| shadowbanned. People make burner accounts for 2-3
| anonymous posts all the time.
| mkl wrote:
| HN doesn't start users shadow banned - just look for the
| green new-account usernames. Your account didn't start
| shadow banned either. Here's your first comment, visible
| to all: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25410162
|
| New accounts are _more likely_ to get shadow banned,
| especially if they post many comments with links or post
| inflammatory remarks.
| hertzrat wrote:
| When you make a new account and view a thread You post in
| for the first week to so, gour comments are absent absent
| unless you are logged in. That's what a shadow ban is. It
| can be removed and it happens to every new hn account
| I've ever seen. It gets removed after a week or so. That
| "inflammatory" post about a game prototype you linked was
| not visible for even a second in that thread until a week
| or two had passed
| mkl wrote:
| I never claimed your post was inflammatory. It does,
| however, contain a link. What the link is to doesn't
| matter, but accounts that post links in their first
| comments are likely to be automatically tagged as spam,
| which I'm guessing is what happened to you. It doesn't
| happen to all HN accounts, as you can see by all the
| brand-new green accounts posting in political threads
| lately.
| [deleted]
| satysin wrote:
| It makes so much sense when you think of Parler as a propaganda
| network and recruitment tool and not a "free speech" social
| network which is exactly how I described my experience with it
| in the mega thread yesterday
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25712762
| jeromegv wrote:
| CEO mentioned on Kara Swisher podcast that he felt he had zero
| responsibility for the content on this platform. So this
| moderation is mostly a PR point.
| boringg wrote:
| I wonder how he would feel about Sect 230 getting rolled
| back. Parler would be down and out (that said it's down and
| out right now).
|
| For clarity I don't support changing 230.
| wnevets wrote:
| Probably the same support had he for allowing companies to
| discriminate against gay couples. Its great until its used
| against him.
| sdenton4 wrote:
| This really is the rule, not the exception. Every time I've
| deigned to wade into conservative "free-speech" zones I've been
| booted out for ideological nonconformity.
|
| Tolerance is a peace treaty:
| https://extranewsfeed.com/tolerance-is-not-a-moral-precept-1...
| berryjerry wrote:
| You still cannot threaten physical violence. This imaginary
| prospect that 'free speech' includes threats is stupid. And
| of course any individual still can block you. It is literally
| the same as Twitter.
| balls187 wrote:
| > It is literally the same as Twitter.
|
| Pretty much.
|
| What I find troubling is that despite containing the same
| cesspool of vile content, Twitter never got booted from
| Google and Apple App stores, and AWS.
| webmaven wrote:
| _> What I find troubling is that despite containing the
| same cesspool of vile content, Twitter never got booted
| from Google and Apple App stores, and AWS._
|
| The difference being that on Parler the 'cesspool' as you
| call it is all there is, or at least it is the main
| attraction.
|
| On Twitter it is easy enough to find, but an average user
| mostly does have to go looking for it, or at least be
| following someone who goes looking for it. Twitter also
| does make efforts to drain the cesspool, although it can
| certainly be debated whether those efforts are sufficient
| or even being made in good faith.
| balls187 wrote:
| Okay, I see that POV--that Twitter is got a pass because
| it's worst content is just a by-product of their
| platform, and Parler didn't because it's worst content
| was the feature of their platform.
| franklampard wrote:
| > The same cesspool of vile content
|
| You are troubling if you really find that
| dang wrote:
| Please don't cross into personal attack, regardless of
| how wrong someone is or you feel they are. We're trying
| to avoid descending further into hell here.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| balls187 wrote:
| Took me less than 30 seconds to type in a racial slur
| into Twitter's search bar and find it.
|
| And I don't even have a twitter account.
| franklampard wrote:
| If you report them they don't get removed on Twitter?
|
| Without a Twitter account you claim that Twitter has the
| same vile content?
| jeanvaljean2463 wrote:
| You can report, but it takes weeks sometimes for the
| content to get actioned.
| wnevets wrote:
| Please send me twitter links of people conspiring to
| commit violence so I can report them.
| Dig1t wrote:
| Here are some interesting ones:
|
| https://twitter.com/MonkeyWrenchATX/status/13162253889059
| 266...
|
| https://twitter.com/MonkeyWrenchATX/status/13089834842880
| 450...
|
| https://twitter.com/Windstalker361/status/129150221759012
| 044...
|
| https://twitter.com/ScothSenpai/status/131143692935179059
| 2
|
| I agree Parler is/was shit and yay for its death, but
| there IS a non-trivial amount of extremist stuff on
| Twitter as well and IMO letting this stuff persist just
| creates further division.
| dbspin wrote:
| The first two of those are non-violent opinions you
| clearly disagree with.
|
| The second two are pro gun ownership - which would be
| perceived as appeals to violence in most of the world,
| but in the US is a perfectly common political position.
|
| So this fails to support your false equivalence re:
| Parler and Twitter.
|
| There's actually plenty of extremist hate filled bile on
| twitter, but these are terrible examples. Search
| "#killallmen" for some readily accessible examples.
|
| Still, kind of absurd to suggest it represents the
| mainstay of content on the platform.
| Dig1t wrote:
| I just think, given the current milieu, that asserting
| that there is literally not such thing as a good cop (a
| hyperbolic and somewhat extremist statement by its very
| nature), and that stealing from corporations (I mean,
| there are lots of videos of people violently smashing
| into stores in recent months) that perhaps this is
| encouraging violence..
|
| Yeah, you can twist the last 2 into a political position.
| But given the context, they seem to me to be appeals to
| violence.
|
| I mean look at just a few tweets down on the same pro gun
| user:
|
| https://twitter.com/Windstalker361/status/131033080427967
| 283...
|
| How is this not inciting violence? What else could
| "seizing the means of production" possibly mean in a
| tweet that literally shows off his/her set of assault
| weapons?
|
| Or literally talking about killing pigs?
|
| https://twitter.com/Windstalker361/status/130913405350173
| 491...
|
| I absolutely don't disagree that there are racial
| problems that we need to solve, or that the police need
| reforming. All I'm saying is that by not acknowledging
| that maybe this needs dealing with too, we are still
| going to have backlash by the other side.
| supernovae wrote:
| There is evidence that Parler is a russian operation
| looking to disrupt American Democracy...
|
| https://twitter.com/davetroy/status/1327271037847867395?s
| =20
| [deleted]
| whimsicalism wrote:
| I've reported plenty of people saying awful things about
| killing black people & jews on Twitter. It's definitely
| there.
| chalst wrote:
| I've had a good experience with flagging bad posts and
| users: about 3/4 of the time the accounts I report get
| suspended. I only go after the really nasty accounts,
| though.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| I have had poor experience with suspension, good
| experience with removal.
| balls187 wrote:
| Twitter has a search feature.
|
| Also this was the very reason Donald Trump's account was
| finally banned, despite YEARS of that rhetoric.
| rconti wrote:
| I made one very earnest and honest libertarian-leaning
| comment on the Redstate forums before I was banned (this was
| probably 15 years ago). Well, it was "fun" while it lasted.
| dboreham wrote:
| Rule: everything is driven by someone's business model.
| joshstrange wrote:
| Agreed, the irony of /r/conservative complaining about
| censorship or their rights to free speech being restricted
| while making submitting posts and commenting "flaired users
| only" (AKA only the users who agree with us and think the
| same way) is completely lost on them...
| sixothree wrote:
| It's not irony. It's pervasive and it's dishonesty plain
| and simple.
| goatgate wrote:
| I discovered this yesterday trying to respond to a post on
| r/conservative about the CCP enforcing ideological
| conformity. I don't know whether to laugh or cry.
| frankfrankfrank wrote:
| That strikes me as far more a function of being on
| reddit. There are no conservatives on reddit and from my
| own interactions with the people on r/conservative, I can
| assure you that they are not in fact what they say they
| are. You may as well go to Weibo looking to advocate
| against the repressive CCP regime, or you can try it a
| bit closer to home and advocate for free speech on
| reddit. Same outcome.
| frankfrankfrank wrote:
| I get that it is a kind of contradiction to claim being
| about free-speech, but to see their point, when free=speech
| and they as the primary advocates for free-speech are under
| clear and direct and persistent and unrelenting assault of
| their speech and thought, I can see how they would take on
| practical positions to protect their community from
| infiltrators and subversives as they are struggling to
| survive under relentless abuse of power.
|
| What you should realize, and this is a general fact, is
| that when any group is withering under constant barrage and
| assault by what is really objectively an evil agenda of
| oppression (freedom of expression is in fact a human right
| under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights),
| regardless of what you believe or say, they do not have the
| luxury of high moral consistency while facing free-speech
| eradication by an evil regime hell bent on controlling all
| aspects of humanity.
|
| And kid yourself not, what the tech companies are doing to
| suppress free speech is not only purely and objectively
| evil, it is a threat to the US Constitution, which is the
| lynchpin and capstone for freedom and liberties all over
| the world too. If the American Constitution/values of free
| speech falter as they seem to be, I pity all the poor souls
| around the world who have lived under an umbrella of the US
| Constitution who will suffer immensely more and in
| deafening silence of globe dominating regime censorship.
|
| There will be no people to take up the cause, e.g., of the
| Uighurs if the US regime wants to make nice with the
| Chinese regime for whatever reason. There will be no
| reporting of atrocities or even knowledge of the lies that
| justified the illegal and immoral invasion of Iraq and the
| killing of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis defending their
| hime against an evil invasion. There will be what the party
| wants ... ney, demands you believe. Please see the book
| 1984 for reference. Many say they have read it, I seriously
| wonder if that is true.
| supernovae wrote:
| Citation Needed
| frankfrankfrank wrote:
| Citation for what? What is it you want someone else to
| tell you to believe instead of using your own mental
| faculties and logic? Do you want a citation to the
| Universal Declaration of Human Rights? I am sure you can
| find that on your own, my friend.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| > protect their community from infiltrators and
| subversives
|
| They see anybody who doesn't toe the Trump line as a
| brigader from r/politics. Everything is a conspiracy. But
| there are a number of very moderate conservatives that
| (for whatever reason) continue to call r/conservative
| their home, and they respond positively when something
| sane gets posted. I've had a couple great conversations
| over there with those folks. I just avoid the endless
| meme threads and other trashy pointless tribal gunk.
| frankfrankfrank wrote:
| I find it hard to ridicule conservatives for the members
| that do them significant disservice through all the
| rather unhealthy obsessive conspiracy stuff because no
| conspiracy nonsense has been likely more amplified over
| about 4 years total at a nonstop pace, day in and day out
| by the propaganda organs of state than the Russian
| collusion conspiracy used to try to cap Trump at his
| knees.
|
| But let's also not forget that the government clearly
| does engage in rather evil conspiracies ... Iraq WMD,
| anyone? And there are hundreds more proven conspiracies.
|
| What we are ally seeing here is the onset of a
| dissolution and dissolving of our social and national
| cohesion. It was a clear and provable risk from
| immigration and diversity as shown for decades in
| research after research from evidence all over the globe
| and history, but her we are. Social cohesion has been
| replaced by not only disintegration, but also by a
| destruction of the methods and ideals that unified the
| USA before. All that I have read and studied on the topic
| over years, essentially condemns the USA to breaking up
| absent of increasing levels of control and repression and
| imposition of a fake kind of unification around hollow
| ideals and values not shared among the actual people and
| cultures that now inhabit the the territory of the former
| USA (a bit of foreshadowing there).
|
| I would love to hear theories on how you keep what are
| essentially distinct colonies of foreign nationals (by
| ethnicity) across the country in a cohesive jurisdiction
| like the USA, especially when you have an increasingly
| and justifiably angered native population that is
| noticing that the promise of utopia through immigration
| was a con job to disenfranchise them of what all people
| of the world would perceive as their birth right, the
| right to keep what those before us created for those
| after them. I just don't see it happening without extreme
| repression, which of course will see escalating reaction
| that will either end in victory or vanquish, for one side
| or another.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| I feel bad for normal conservatives. They clearly exist,
| but they're getting quiet because the brand is severely
| tarnished right now. Then the only people talking are the
| Trump supporters, and the loop is reinforced.
| frankfrankfrank wrote:
| I think you are mistaking something. Conservatism is not
| a brand. But what you are referring to is actually the
| vilification of the people who insist on wanting to keep
| (something they see as a right) what they have and built
| or was built for them by people who freely gave it to
| them. I suspect your misunderstanding of what
| conservatism is, is also a driving force that will
| destabilize things further because it is such a
| fundamental misunderstanding that conservatism is not
| like the brand of the Democratic party.
|
| You appear to think of it as some kind of opposing sports
| team. I know the following will incense a lot of people
| here, but reality though is that the basic dualism is
| those how have and built something wanting to keep that;
| while those who did not build or have, want to acquire
| and take what they did not contribute to, build, or have.
| A thief is a person that wants what he did not create,
| deserve, or earn; yet wants to benefit from (or he would
| not steal it).
|
| Essentially a person with such a mindset is a "liberal"
| with other people's things, opposed to a conservative
| that wants to keep what he earned as well as you keep
| what you legitimately earned. It's really just age old
| conflict captured in Aesop's fable of the Ants and the
| Grasshopper. That model manifests itself in the real
| world through things like the "communists" who want to
| take over what they don't understand and did not build
| and yet think they can operate, let alone even maintain;
| the people that object to huge student loans they
| willingly agreed to and want to benefit from, while not
| wanting to pay the cost; or immigrants to anywhere who
| want to receive what is essentially a part of the wealth
| and what others of a country built, not only zero cost,
| but to immense benefit and profit at the cost of the
| local population.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| Interesting, are there lots of people who see it in these
| terms? It's very favorable to conservatives, and not so
| much to liberals, which leads me to suspect it is more
| wishful thinking than an accurate depiction of partisan
| politics. It looks a lot like what I'd expect someone to
| write if they weren't arguing in good faith, but were in
| fact playing this discussion like a team sport.
| turtle_san wrote:
| There is a huge difference between a platform
| censoring/banning you and a community on the platform
| censoring/banning you. No irony involved. That subreddit is
| just trying to have discussion among like minded people
| without trolls and brigaders disrupting everything, they
| are a highly targeted subreddit for those acts. Reddit as a
| platform still exists for you and joining or making new
| communities is possible at the click of a button. Contrast
| that with having to create your own platform which is
| prohibitive, or migrating to another platform (if one even
| exists), which is also prohibitive.
|
| And now we have a most recent grievance of a group getting
| removed from all platforms, creating their own platform,
| only for it to be removed from existence by mobile devices
| and web infrastructure dropping it.
| kungito wrote:
| Wasn't the_donald subreddit doing a lot of brigading and
| censoring not just the trolls but anyone with a differing
| opinion?
| bena wrote:
| > That subreddit is just trying to have discussion among
| like minded people without trolls and brigaders
| disrupting everything
|
| I love this incredibly sanitized version of what goes on
| in /r/conservative.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| It's totally fine to create a closed group to talk
| amongst like-minded people, just don't try to make a
| claim that it's superior or pro-free-speech.
|
| To the credit of the moderators of r/conservative, they
| don't really claim that, though some of their users try
| to. They're very open about their intentions. They
| absolutely do not welcome non-tribe members.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| Is there something in reddit "bylaws" that says any post
| has to be accepted in a group that meant specifically for a
| certain group "/r/..." ? I thought moderators could
| allow/disallow whatever they wanted as long as it doesn't
| violate TOS or is illegal? I have seen the same thing in
| more left leaning, women's rights, or whatever. Am I
| missing something in your complaint? That said all that
| the_donald/conservative/etc is a dumpster fire.
| netzone wrote:
| I believe he was just noting the irony of someone
| claiming something, then openly not doing so, rather than
| any rules being broken.
| bmarquez wrote:
| /r/conservative moderates their platform to accept all
| types of conservatives, including the authoritarian "let's
| spend all our money on the military and censor everything
| we don't like" types.
|
| They also took in an massive influx of new users after
| the_donald was banned which permanently changed its
| discourse.
|
| And as the biggest right-leaning political subreddit,
| r/conservative also took in an influx of people posting
| death threats and insults due to its visibility. Examples
| are occasionally screenshotted by the moderators, and I'm
| not surprised they moved to 'flaired users only' to keep up
| with moderation.
|
| Smaller government, free-speech conservatives on Reddit
| tend to hang out in more libertarian subreddits.
| supernovae wrote:
| Those "more libertarian subreddits" seem to have similar
| behaviors...
| bmarquez wrote:
| Examples? "Flaired users only" doesn't exist in any of
| the other subreddits I frequent, and all subreddits (even
| non-political ones) reserve the right to remove off-topic
| or uncivil comments.
| spiralx wrote:
| /r/libertarian was famously unmoderated for years until
| the drama a couple of years when the head moderator
| finally resurfaced and decided to step in after alt-right
| mods took over the sub:
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/SubredditDrama/comments/ajg8ng/r
| lib...
|
| Slashdot is the only major site that was unmoderated in
| this sense - during the 10+ years I read it the only post
| ever removed was one with links to Scientology materials
| that they'd been threatened with litigation over. They
| replaced it with an explanation of why they'd removed the
| comment followed by a bunch of links to anti-Scientology
| sites :)
|
| It had a lot of crap posted there but mostly coped with
| it, simpler times I think. Their system allowing you to
| choose the vote threshold for visible posts helped a lot
| with that.
| hef19898 wrote:
| I am slowly suspecting that being capable of tremendous
| levels of cognitive disoance, without realizing it, is one
| of the common denominators of radicals. Quite obvious in
| right wingers, but I wouldn't exclude others, I just saw it
| more at the right end of the political spectrum.
| stjohnswarts wrote:
| I think what you're looking for individuals that think "I
| believe" without any proof at all is a valid "reason" for
| doing whatever they like as long as they "believe" it. It
| is proof against any science or logical reasoning because
| "I believe" is the only level of verification they need
| to follow a group/tyrant/whatever.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| Have you ever been to /r/politics? It's a groupthink circle
| jerk. The difference, of course, is that /r/conservative is
| explicitly defined as a conservative community while
| /r/politics implies they are some sort of neutral community
| which they most certainly are not. At any rate, finding a
| diverse community of ideological people coming together to
| discuss politics with intellectual fervor is rather
| difficult these days. Part of the reason is the design of
| the software itself. HN does a better job of this than most
| because of very careful design choices and solid
| moderation. But if this could be accomplished for politics
| in general, I think it would be a good thing for society.
| trianglem wrote:
| The fact that you're blind to the hypocrisy in this post
| makes you look like a brainwashed shill.
| HaloZero wrote:
| /r/moderatepolitics is pretty reasonable though the idea
| of "moderate" is more about speech than views.
| junon wrote:
| Nobody has mentioned r/anime_titties yet. It's easily one
| of the best I was a part of when I was still on Reddit.
| Everyone had different opinions and viewpoints and things
| stayed very neutral. Even the mods preferred to comment
| on potentially shady links rather than delete them.
|
| And no, this isn't a troll; it's one of those reverse-
| name subreddits.
| spiralx wrote:
| r/NeutralPolitics/ used to be good for discussion as well
| due to heavy moderation including requiring sources for
| claims. I've not read it in quite a while though.
| neuronexmachina wrote:
| Yep, it's one of the best subreddits around, commenters
| just need to keep in mind their rules of civil discourse.
| thebigman433 wrote:
| I think the difference is that r/politics doesnt actually
| ban you for posting something conservative, its just the
| users deciding they dont like it. I dont use it either
| way due to their horrible link rules, but there is
| definitely a difference in my opinion.
| vbezhenar wrote:
| You're silenced by moderators or you're silenced by
| users. I don't see much difference in the end.
| baby wrote:
| I think you're commenting without having tried to post on
| r/conservative
| lc9er wrote:
| The difference is that the community observed your
| opinion and decided it provided no value. That could be a
| pro or con, based on many factors.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| There's a huge difference. The freedom to disagree is a
| fundamental part of free speech. The very fact that you
| get a big response from the community means you are
| definitely being heard. They just don't agree with you.
| When moderators do it, nobody even sees what you are
| saying.
| Lutger wrote:
| Not being listened to is very different from being
| silenced.
| malandrew wrote:
| If the first few people to see something downvotes you
| into oblivion before the majority arriving later get a
| chance to see your content, that's silencing, not merely
| not being listened to. This is doubly true when those
| first few people are likely to be regulars that refresh
| pages often. This means that a few people that are
| ideologically on the same page can drive the ideological
| view of an entire forum without actually being a
| moderator.
| pixl97 wrote:
| Then you are lost.
| jimbokun wrote:
| Comments "silenced" by users can generally still be found
| by sorting by "controversial".
| burntsushi wrote:
| I think you're missing the point. /r/conservative
| censoring views or users is just fine. They can define
| the norms of their own community and enforce them.
|
| Just don't hypocritically declare that other people can't
| also do the same. That's the point here. The hypocrisy.
| kyrra wrote:
| If you read messages from the moderators, its normally
| not about censoring, it's more about keeping up with
| moderating content. That sub is heavily brigaded (I saw
| some based that was at 17% upvote). And any sub that has
| toxic comments on it will be removed by the admins. Going
| flare only makes their job way easier.
| yifanl wrote:
| If the only thing it takes for censorship to not be
| censorship is that it'd make the lives of those in charge
| easier, then censorship doesn't exist.
| xupybd wrote:
| I think HN does better than most because they remain non
| political and heavily moderate on the basis of relevance.
| Also because Dang is so active and impartial.
| [deleted]
| supernovae wrote:
| Just look at reddit / r / conservative. You _have_ to be
| proven to be conservative before you can post, yet, they
| preach about first amendment, freedom of speech and your
| rights all the time.
| frankfrankfrank wrote:
| It is not possible for that page to be conservative,
| regardless of what the sub is called. The title is
| irrelevant, it is the nature of the thing that makes it
| such.
|
| Going to /r/conservative is like a red cross visit of a
| communist labor camp and all the inmates have brand new
| clothes with creases in them. A facade of what the regime
| thinks a conservative subreddit should look like. Do you
| actually think that people can espouse "conservative", let
| alone even non-regime conformant beliefs anywhere on
| Reddit? The thousands of reddit accounts piled up in the
| digital mass graves would suggest not.
| liminal wrote:
| FWIW I've found that true on the left as well
| Kaze404 wrote:
| Can you name any left-leaning communities that promote
| "unmoderated" free-speech? As someone who's in many left-
| leaning communities, this would be news to me and I'm
| genuinely curious to how it works.
| pixl97 wrote:
| You cannot have both an open community on the internet
| and unmoderated content. The right says they do this, but
| it is a lie. Even cesspools like the chans have heavy
| moderation to keep them from turning into a porn
| distribution form.
| ativzzz wrote:
| I think the biggest difference between far-left and far-
| right communities is that far-left communities don't
| pretend to have free speech. And because they don't care
| about free speech they are more willing to shut down
| content that the host platform may object to, like calls
| to violence. See places like /r/latestagecapitalism.
| supernovae wrote:
| The left understands the complexity of free speech, the
| right weaponizes free speech. Huge difference.
| TedDoesntTalk wrote:
| I don't know about "communities", but there were
| definitely many people calling for violence at BLM
| protests and marches in 2020.
| thymorningafter wrote:
| The difference being that BLM movement actually has many
| decades (centuries?) of concrete evidence of racial
| injustice and oppression compared to the baseless claims
| of voter fraud and a supposed stolen election.
| pixl97 wrote:
| There are a lot of people that are unwilling to give an
| abused minority even the slightest leeway, and instead
| while holding the majority position holding power, claim
| they are the ones that are abused.
| liminal wrote:
| Can't reply to Kaze404's reply to this, but just wanted to
| say that I didn't intend to compare Parler to any left-wing
| social network or group I'm aware of. Just saying that from
| my experience with the left, there are condoned views and
| straying outside the lines isn't healthy for group
| inclusion. I'm also explicitly not equivocating the
| validity of the views themselves.
| Kaze404 wrote:
| Thanks for the clarification. I agree, that's a
| phenomenon I see often as well, and while I think that
| there are some indefensible positions even on the left, I
| think some of the communities I'm part of would benefit
| from giving the benefit of the doubt more often.
| specialist wrote:
| Freedom Speeches(tm) is only for the in-group.
| nabla9 wrote:
| One of the founders (with big money) was Rebekah Mercer, owner
| of the Breitbart News.
| JBSay wrote:
| As opposed to what? Twitter? All social media platforms are
| ideologically moderated.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| By that standard, Instagram is a propaganda weapon.
|
| It both:
|
| a. pays popular users
|
| b. Puts warnings on political issues, like statements that
| Biden's crime bill contributed to mass incarceration [0]
|
| [0]
| https://twitter.com/ben_awareness/status/1339293381625864195
| crispywalrus wrote:
| Instagram doesn't claim to be a "free speech" platform. You
| have to only be mildly interested in it to see that it's all
| about "engagement" Parler explicitly claimed "free speech" as
| a goal
| whimsicalism wrote:
| So because the owners claim the platform to be something
| other than it actually is, it is okay for this person to
| leak the Parler users' private images and videos?
| hertzrat wrote:
| Whether you like him or not, Zuckerberg has gotten in a
| lot of trouble over the years for resisting censorship
| pressure. His actions suggest it's something he values
| [deleted]
| escape_goat wrote:
| So, because the owners (a) claim that Parler is a free
| speech platform when (b) actually it engages in extensive
| moderation to ensure ideological conformity in their
| posts, then (c) Parler is more of a propaganda weapon
| than a free speech platform. That was the point that was
| being made in the context of a number of erroneous
| references to Parler being unmoderated. One can debate
| whether the data leak was ethical, but one should not
| base one's position on a false understanding of what
| Parler is.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| Fair enough, although I'll note that this condition (a)
| was tacked on after the similarities to IG were pointed
| out.
|
| I guess the point I was trying to make is whether or not
| Parler is moderated to me seems irrelevant to the
| permissibility of this action.
| cgriswald wrote:
| 'Free speech platform' is a meaningless phrase, because
| it means different things to different people.
|
| Almost anyone would agree that a platform which allows
| any speech at all is a 'free speech platform' even if
| they don't agree with allowing certain kinds of speech.
|
| Most people would agree a platform that allows any speech
| outside of socially accepted exceptions ( _e.g._ threats
| of violence, slander) is a 'free speech platform'.
|
| But for people who are largely not allowed to share their
| views (rightly or wrongly) a platform which is heavily
| moderated for ideological conformity can _also_ be a
| 'free speech platform' if they agree with the ideology,
| because they are free to speak all the speech they want
| to speak and are prevented from doing on other platforms.
| It's pretty clear that Parler falls into this category.
| jabberwcky wrote:
| Unfortunately you won't find much interesting commentary
| in a politically charged thread like this, best to just
| scan and pattern match the kind of exchanges occurring
| before moving swiftly along.
| julianmarq wrote:
| > best to just scan and pattern match the kind of
| exchanges occurring before moving swiftly along.
|
| How _do_ you do that? I 've noticed lately that HN
| commentary (at least in threads like this) has trended
| increasingly pro-censorship[1] lately, and it's pretty
| disheartening to read.
|
| Would rather do something like what you say, but I'm not
| quite sure what you mean.
|
| [1]: Which is a bit ironic, thinking about it.
| awb wrote:
| > increasingly pro-censorship[1] lately
|
| The US has always had limits on free speech.
|
| > Freedom of speech and expression, therefore, may not be
| recognized as being absolute, and common limitations or
| boundaries to freedom of speech relate to libel, slander,
| obscenity, pornography, sedition, incitement, fighting
| words, classified information, copyright violation, trade
| secrets, food labeling, non-disclosure agreements, the
| right to privacy, dignity, the right to be forgotten,
| public security, and perjury. Justifications for such
| include the harm principle, proposed by John Stuart Mill
| in On Liberty, which suggests that "the only purpose for
| which power can be rightfully exercised over any member
| of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent
| harm to others."
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech
|
| Incitement, sedition, public security and harm to others
| seem to be relevant to this discussion.
| julianmarq wrote:
| > [US limits on free speech] seem to be relevant to this
| discussion.
|
| But not to my comment, and not just because I'm not from
| the USA.
|
| I'm not speaking in favor of parler if that's what you
| assumed (for some reason). Specially if it is, like the
| top comment said, just a propaganda machine trying to
| enforce a single viewpoint. That's antithesis to free
| speech.
| awb wrote:
| I was referring to the comment where you say HN is
| "bizarrely" more "pro-censorship".
|
| Where you see "pro-censorship", many see speech that
| historically has never been protected in the US like
| calls to violence, or speech that insights others to
| violence.
|
| Companies gave Trump et. al. the benefit of the doubt on
| the "inciting violence" part, until the violence actually
| materialized and the FBI warned of groups organizing
| online to coordinate future violent attacks.
| julianmarq wrote:
| > I was referring to the comment where you say HN is
| "bizarrely" more "pro-censorship". Where you see "pro-
| censorship", many see speech that historically has never
| been protected
|
| I didn't use the word "bizarrely" and I'm not talking
| about condemnation of unprotected speech (and again, not
| just because I'm not from the USA). I've seen people
| arguing that the concept of free speech itself is
| "outdated" and that societies that hold it are "doomed to
| collapse", and that's just an example.
|
| > [Trump]
|
| Again, I wasn't talking about parler nor about Trump. I
| would appreciate it if you stopped trying to imply that
| I'm talking about stuff I'm not, or steering the
| conversation toward subjects I've never even alluded to.
| awb wrote:
| > I didn't use the word "bizarrely"
|
| Sorry, I meant "ironic".
|
| > I've seen people arguing that the concept of free
| speech itself is "outdated" and that societies that hold
| it are "doomed to collapse", and that's just an example.
|
| Maybe downvoted far down the thread, but the majority of
| the upvoted "censorship" discussions have been directly
| related to Big Tech's deplatforming of Trump & Parler in
| response to the capital attacks, and how the existing
| limits on US free speech apply to these decisions.
| julianmarq wrote:
| > Maybe downvoted far down the thread
|
| No, and no. Please don't tell me what I have or have not
| seen myself.
|
| > [Trump and parler again]
|
| Okay, this is the third time so I won't try again to tell
| you I have no interest in talking about that. I'll just
| say that the first time I noticed _generally well
| received_ [1] comments in favor of censorship was almost
| two years ago, in a thread that had nothing to do with
| Trump (and I'm not sure if parler even existed by then).
| According to what I've noticed, it has been growing in
| prominence since.
|
| [1]: Which is to say, they weren't downvoted nor pushed
| downthread and even though they had several replies
| disputing them; they had just as many agreeing.
| awb wrote:
| > Please don't tell me what I have or have not seen
| myself.
|
| Can you link to these posts?
|
| I've been following the threads, but haven't seen people
| arguing that the concept of free speech itself is
| "outdated" and that societies that hold it are "doomed to
| collapse".
|
| The only "censorship" I've seen people supporting is
| against speech that has never been protected by the 1st
| amendment, which isn't being "pro-censorship" or
| "censorship" at all, it's just the same laws we've had
| here in the US for centuries.
|
| Again, happy to take a look at what you're seeing on HN
| if you can link to a few threads.
| julianmarq wrote:
| Before I give you one of the recent examples I saw, I'm
| curious about why you're asking for examples in the first
| place. You already seem pretty disinclined to agree with
| me as evidenced by how you keep trying to suggest that
| I'm talking about condemnation of unprotected speech,
| which I haven't and have said so several times. My first
| comment was merely asking someone for clarification on
| how he parsed these threads; I didn't even talk about the
| subject at hand because I have no interest to and yet
| that's almost exclusively what you have tried to talk
| about. Not sure what exactly would be changed in this
| conversation by my giving you an example. You've been
| assuming bad faith on my part from the get go so I feel
| it would be just another fruitless exercise, or lead into
| another discussion on the merits of free speech I
| _certainly_ don 't want to get into, again.
|
| By the way, you're completely free to defend these
| gigantic corporations deplatforming whoever they want; I
| wasn't talking about that in my original comment. That
| implication was already present in my first reply, but
| maybe my saying it outright will convince you that I
| don't mean anything bad with my comments.
| awb wrote:
| > I'm curious about why you're asking for examples in the
| first place
|
| Because you said: "I've noticed lately that HN commentary
| (at least in threads like this) has trended increasingly
| pro-censorship[1] lately", "[1]: Which is a bit ironic,
| thinking about it."
|
| I haven't had that experience and don't understand the
| irony. Just trying to understand where you're coming from
| and thought links might help.
|
| I think I misunderstood "lately" to mean the censorship /
| violent speech debate about the resulting Big Tech
| deplatformings, which is why I keep bringing those up. In
| the US, taking down violent, insightful speech is not
| considered censorship, which is why I was confused about
| who you're referring to that is "pro-censorship", but
| again maybe I crossed some wires there.
|
| I care about free speech a lot and if there's a growing
| trend that speech that's always been protected by the 1st
| amendment is being targeted, it's a line we all need to
| be very sensitive to and vigilant in defending.
| julianmarq wrote:
| Just in case, the irony, for me, is that if I were in
| favor of censorship, _I_ would be the first person I
| censor, instead of using an online forum to speak in
| favor of censorship. I feel that there 's irony in using
| a widely accessed medium just to talk about how
| censorship is better.
|
| And here's an example:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25715809
|
| (It bears noticing how the post whose thread that comment
| belongs to is certainly _not_ about the banning of Trump
| or parler).
| awb wrote:
| Ok, so that is a good example of protected speech that we
| might not like. I read through the thread and you did a
| good job explaining the perils of censoring viewpoints.
|
| The US has long done a "controlled burn" in banning
| violent speech, but we do need to be vigilant that it
| doesn't turn into a wild fire.
|
| I don't understand why they removed the tweet instead of
| labeling it if they really want to be in the fact
| checking business.
| wrs wrote:
| The use of the term "censorship" is itself a negative
| signal, as it preempts useful discussion by imposing a
| false dichotomy.
|
| There's no feasible zero-censorship scenario (see
| "yelling fire in a crowded theater", etc.) so pretty much
| everyone is "pro-censorship" to some degree. But pretty
| much no one wants preapproval of every utterance either,
| so everyone is also "anti-censorship".
|
| If you see someone talking about "damping positive
| disinformation feedback loops" or something like that,
| rather than "censorship", that's one signal there's a
| substantive discussion taking place.
|
| (Zero censorship is kind of like absolute anarchy: an
| interesting thought experiment that may be useful to
| inform a practical debate.)
| julianmarq wrote:
| _> But pretty much no one wants preapproval of every
| utterance either, so everyone is also "anti-censorship"._
|
| I've seen people arguing that the concept of free speech
| is "outdated" and that societies that hold it are "doomed
| to collapse", just as an example of what I meant in my
| first comment.
|
| _> so pretty much everyone is "pro-censorship" to some
| degree_
|
| Please, don't. You're arguing against an extreme of my
| comment instead of what I actually meant[1] (which, of
| course, you're free to do, but I would also be just as
| free to dismiss it as a bad faith argument), but also
| you're extending something _you_ might believe onto
| others. You 're of course free to be "pro-censorship",
| but you don't know what everyone else thinks, and
| certainly not what I think.
|
| _> The use of the term "censorship" is itself a negative
| signal, as it preempts useful discussion by imposing a
| false dichotomy._
|
| I completely disagree with this. The example I gave is
| absolutely an argument in favor of censorship.
|
| _> If you see someone talking about "damping positive
| disinformation feedback loops" or something like that,
| rather than "censorship", that's one signal there's a
| substantive discussion taking place._
|
| Excusing it by saying "dampening positive disinformation
| feedback loops" _is_ excusing censorship. You might
| refuse to call it such, but I don 't have a reason not
| to.
|
| [1]: For starters, I'm aware that there's unprotected
| speech for a reason, and I _never_ called condemnation of
| such speech "censorship".
| vegcel wrote:
| Zuckerberg: "Whether you like Facebook or not, we need to
| recognize what is at stake and come together to stand for
| free expression at this critical moment."
|
| https://about.fb.com/news/2019/10/mark-zuckerberg-stands-
| for...
| syops wrote:
| You've made an argument that Instagram engages in some form
| of advancing certain viewpoints. You have not demonstrated
| that this is extensive and that Instagram enforces
| ideological conformity or that Instagram actively pays people
| to engage in said advancement of political agendas.
|
| There appears to be quite a difference between what Instagram
| does and what Parler does. The two do not appear to be
| comparable.
| bzb6 wrote:
| Get an Instagram account and say something against
| feminism, diversity, fat people, etc and see what happens.
| beepboopbeep wrote:
| It's not unreasonable for a person instigating something
| through negative posts to receive negative reactions in
| return. That seems self evident.
| dd36 wrote:
| Consequence free speech seems to be what is desired on
| these platforms. This was inevitable.
|
| You can't monetize consequence free speech. It has to be
| in dark places like 4chan.
| Wintamute wrote:
| I think the point is that you don't need to make
| "negative posts" about those topics, rather discussing
| them from any angle that isn't the accepted progressive
| orthodoxy results in the ban hammer.
| bzb6 wrote:
| Even here: my comment is already flagged.
| awb wrote:
| > discussing them from any angle that isn't the accepted
| progressive orthodoxy results in the ban hammer
|
| What are some examples of this?
| malandrew wrote:
| No dog in this particular fight as I don't care either
| way but to answer your question: I've seen plenty of
| examples involving TERFs or questioning transgender women
| in women's sports where the ban hammer was brought out.
|
| Another example is being egalitarian instead of
| equitarian. Being strictly egalitarian gets you labeled
| racist pretty quickly in many online forums. Just this
| past week in my neighborhood Buy Nothing group someone
| put up an item and made it available only to BIPOC
| people. Some people called it out as discriminatory and
| antithetical to community-building. They got called
| racist and accused of white fragility and were both muted
| for two weeks. No one on the side of orthodoxy got muted.
| malandrew wrote:
| Another example: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article
| -9019539/Facebook-pr...
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > Instagram actively pays people to engage in said
| advancement of political agendas.
|
| I haven't seen evidence that Parler's payments are
| specifically tied to promoting certain political agendas
| versus just being an influential poster.
|
| > You have not demonstrated that this is extensive
|
| Well, I've demonstrated it as convincingly as the user
| above who linked to a twitter post of someone just saying
| they have "robust moderation."
| syops wrote:
| I don't claim anything about the veracity of the post you
| responded to or about your claims either. Except that
| your claims aren't an apt comparison because your
| comparison is logically flawed. Instagram paying some
| users for their content isn't the same as Instagram
| paying people to advocate a certain political agenda. And
| having a moderation system in place isn't the same as
| having a moderation system in place that is designed to
| ensure only a certain political viewpoint is discussed.
| And you've made no claims about Instagram enforcing only
| one political viewpoint.
|
| I was just pointing out that your statements, if true,
| still don't support your conclusion as they don't provide
| an apt comparison to the claims about Parler.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > And you've made no claims about Instagram enforcing
| only one political viewpoint.
|
| I think I've made pretty explicit claims about political
| moderation by Instagram. Personally, I'm not a huge fan
| of racism/sexism/etc. so I find it hard to mind, but as
| I've shown, they also moderate contested political
| claims, like stuff about Biden's crime bill, Hunter
| Biden, etc.
|
| Those are political issues, and I've provided evidence of
| them enforcing that viewpoint. The original comment
| provided no actual evidence of Parler enforcing a single
| viewpoint, but we all know what Parler is so it doesn't
| take (me at least) much convincing.
|
| I've explained both why my comparisons are not logically
| flawed (no evidence that Parler pays for a "certain
| political agenda") and have stronger epistemic backing
| than the claims being made about Parler.
| syops wrote:
| You haven't given any evidence that Instagram enforces
| only one viewpoint. And I'd be shocked if Instagram only
| pays for political posts from one side of the debate in
| American politics. That Instagram seeks to counter what
| it perceives of as false political claims has been
| convincingly made. That it does so to advance only one
| certain political agenda has not been made.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| My evidence was attempting to show that "claims Instagram
| thinks are true" is an explicitly political category. By
| moderating away political claims that diverge from that
| category, IG is advancing a political agenda.
|
| You're asking me to prove the much harder claim that IG
| has never taken moderation action against political
| beliefs on the other side of the political spectrum.
|
| Of course, that is
|
| a. an extremely hard claim to prove on an internet forum
| like this, because I'd have to have an index of all of
| IGs enforcement actions to prove that _none_ of them met
| this criteria you 've set up.
|
| b. _not even close_ to proven in the case of Parler by
| the original poster
| syops wrote:
| From my perspective the proper response to OP is to
| either
|
| 1. point out how the claims made about Parler are false.
|
| 2. point out that this is done by other large social
| media websites and thus Parler should not be singled out.
|
| Keep in mind that by "this" in 2 I mean specifically that
| there are large social media sites that are designed
| specifically to enforce a certain political viewpoint. As
| I see it neither of these were done by you.
|
| I think though that we will not agree on these points and
| I accept that. Thank you for the engagement. I will read
| and consider any response you have and leave the
| discussion at that.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > designed specifically to enforce a certain political
| viewpoint
|
| I'll try to break down my claim more simply. Saying
| something like "I don't really care about any political
| issues, but abortion is fundamentally wrong" _is_ a
| political viewpoint. If IG took moderation action against
| people who were saying pro-abortion things, we would call
| that enforcing a certain political viewpoint.
|
| Similarly, a statement like "all claims are fine except
| for those that tie Biden's crime bill to mass
| incarceration" is, again, a _political viewpoint_. It
| perhaps doesn 't map cleanly onto left or right or pro-
| Trump vs. anti-Trump, but the set of claims that IG picks
| to dispute is _political_ because the issues around Biden
| 's crime bill (for instance) were political.
|
| I'm neutral on whether Parler should be "singled out", my
| point was merely that the two conditions set up by OP are
| not sufficient to single out Parler, compared to the
| actions taken by other social media networks.
|
| Likewise, thanks for engaging.
| lghh wrote:
| That claim about the Crime Bill is mostly accurate. The vast,
| vast, vast, majority of incarceration is the fault of states
| and not done at a federal level. While the bill was
| deplorable, it didn't really contribute all that much.
|
| https://twitter.com/johnfpfaff/status/1128369019164200960?la.
| ..
| leereeves wrote:
| The 1994 crime bill included a number of provisions that
| increased incarceration at the state level, such as:
|
| > $9.7 billion in funding for prisons, [including]
| incentive grants to ... qualifying states that enforced
| mandatory sentencing of 85% of a person's sentence
| conviction,
|
| > [eliminating federal grants for] lower-income prison
| inmates to receive college educations during their term of
| imprisonment,
|
| and funding for 100,000 more police officers.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-strikes_law
| whimsicalism wrote:
| I think this is a contested claim and you can find
| prominent academics on the other side talking about
|
| a. how federal action modeled action for states, including
| substantial incentive schemes for incarceration (indeed
| that is how almost every Federal bill works)
|
| b. how the rate of incarceration _given_ the crime being
| committed increased post-crime bill.
|
| I think it is a discussion to be had, not something to be a
| priori fact-checked as "False."
| hnuser847 wrote:
| There's a legitimate debate to be had over the consequences
| of the 1994 crime bill and whether or not is was a good
| policy. The point is that Instagram (and every other social
| media platform that puts these disclaimers on their posts)
| is not merely moderating content any more. They're actively
| participating in politics and trying to persuade their
| users to feel a certain way about controversial topics.
| Which is to say, they're really no different than Parler or
| any of the big box media outlets.
| chrononaut wrote:
| > _b. Puts warnings on political issues, like statements that
| Biden 's crime bill contributed to mass incarceration_
|
| I assume that point was an extension of OP's comment of:
| "that they use to ensure ideological conformity in their
| posts."
|
| For those interested, here is a link to the USA Today article
| from the screenshot evaluating whether "the crime bill
| brought mass incarceration to Black Americans": https://www.u
| satoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/07/03/fac...
|
| > _Stephen Ross Johnson, of Knoxville, Tennessee, a board
| member of the National Association of Criminal Defense
| Lawyers and past president of the Tennessee Association of
| Criminal Defense Lawyers, told USA TODAY that it is "over
| simplistic" to say the 1994 crime bill led to mass
| incarceration._
|
| > _Asked if the bill caused or largely contributed to it,
| Johnson says: "The bottom line answer to that is no. Was it a
| link in the chain? Yes. Is it the beginning of the chain?
| No."_
|
| > _Johnson argues that the roots of mass incarceration can be
| found in the late 1960s and early 1970s, with legislation
| that created, among other things, the RICO statute, which
| broadened the scope of federal law as the war on drugs began
| to take shape._
|
| I'd say I agree with the points in the article over the non-
| contextual, anonyomous, blanket statement that the crime bill
| brought ("caused") mass incarceration of Black Americans.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > I'd say I agree with the points in the article over the
| non-contextual, anonyomous, blanket statement that the
| crime bill brought ("caused") mass incarceration of Black
| Americans.
|
| Perhaps it is not an appropriately nuanced claim - I would
| be curious if there is equal enforcement of the
| "contextual" clarity of claims made in all political memes
| though. My guess is no, and it is also a _quite common_
| view among academics that the crime bill is a large link in
| the story behind mass incarceration.
|
| I haven't, for instance, seen fact-checking of memes about
| Russia "stealing" the election or Donald Trump being a
| servant of Putin, despite those claims being potentially
| "non-contextual."
|
| You may agree with the points. But does that make it beyond
| the pale of discussion and must be "fact-checked" away?
|
| e: Rather than downvotes, I would be curious what others'
| thoughts are here.
| klyrs wrote:
| > I haven't, for instance, seen fact-checking of memes
| about Russia "stealing" the election or Donald Trump
| being a servant of Putin, despite those claims being
| potentially "non-contextual."
|
| Have you heard of the Mueller Report? There's been
| extensive fact-checking on this, and Trump obstructed the
| investigation.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > Have you heard of the Mueller Report? There's been
| extensive fact-checking on this, and Trump obstructed the
| investigation.
|
| I have, of course. My claim is just that Russia
| "stealing" the election might be non-"contextual" if
| what's been shown is that Russia ran extensive
| misinformation campaigns, since the election was still
| ultimately decided by people voting, no evidence of
| extensive fraud, etc. , etc.
|
| Of course, perhaps it is still a "steal" simply because
| of the effect of that interference/influence campaign.
| And similarly, perhaps the 1994 crime bill had an
| influence on future downstream state actions around
| incarceration. There's a discussion to be had about the
| topic. _Neither_ "fact-check"-ing seems non-ideological
| to me.
| bzb6 wrote:
| That's true but Instagram doesn't claim to be a free speech
| platform
| whimsicalism wrote:
| So that makes it permissible for private actors to publish
| 70TBs of private Parler users' messages?
| bzb6 wrote:
| I did not say anything like that
| whimsicalism wrote:
| I guess I'm confused as to the relevance to this thread.
| This person claimed that two attributes made Parler a
| "propaganda weapon", I noted that other major platforms
| have those same properties, so you tacked on another
| condition.
|
| Presumably this was all in an effort to say something
| along the lines of - "because of the unique situation
| Parler is in, these actions were permissible." No?
| bzb6 wrote:
| I'm one of the most right wing and pro free speech humans
| to ever set foot on this site. You are beating up the
| wrong person. I was merely replying to you regardless of
| what your parent comment said.
| KnobbleMcKnees wrote:
| They're using this bad faith / fallacious argument all
| over the thread, so, at the least, it isn't personal.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| I'm in perfectly fine faith, and I'd love for you to
| point out the fallacies.
| muyuu wrote:
| it's a sensational title
|
| they are doing bulk scrapping of Parler and they do many
| other sites like Reddit too, and particularly stuff that
| is being taken down for archival purposes
|
| also there is nothing - and I mean nothing, but
| particularly threats of violence - in Parler you don't
| see in Twitter in more abundance, only it's more
| typically leftists on Twitter and rightists on Parler
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| I didn't see anyone claim that.
| debt wrote:
| "a. pays popular users"
|
| Source?
| vegcel wrote:
| Yes
| herdcall wrote:
| I doubt this. I'm on Parler and frequently see posts (I presume
| from left leaning folks) trashing the right side (e.g., Trump).
| Those posts are allowed with no issues. It is true that most
| opinions are right leaning (some viciously so), but that IMO
| reflects more on the members than on the moderation policy.
| Discussions on Twitter have a similar mix (left leaning to
| rabid Trump bashing), and I honestly don't find any difference
| in the fervor, except that Parler is right leaning and Twitter
| is left leaning.
|
| The general tendency these days, fed by narratives from
| interested parties like the media, is to mash all right leaners
| (pretty much any one supporting the conservative ideas and
| opposing the Democrats) as clueless, racist, redneck, neo-Nazis
| (a bit of hyperbole here, but you see what I mean). Once you
| think that way (that "they're all nub jobs"), pretty much
| anything from leaking their user info to shutting them down to
| throwing them in jail would seem OK. Please, please don't fall
| into the trap and accept the "all right is nuts" narrative and
| decide for yourself.
| freeone3000 wrote:
| Actions speak for themselves. The right isn't a unified
| block.
|
| There are traditonal conservatives: god, guns, limited
| government. Mitch McConnell, David French, Mitt Romney,
| Charlotte Lawson. I fundamentally have different values from
| these people, but their perspectives are useful,
| enlightening, and reading their viewpoints causes me to
| better defend my own, or even occasionally change. They are
| staunch defenders of individual rights and traditional
| liberty.
|
| There are libertarians on the right. Rand Paul, Spike Cohen,
| Justin Amash. These people I share a surprising number of
| values with, but fundamentally disagree with on the
| conclusion. Due to an inherent argumentativeness, it's hard
| to get a good faith debate, but I acknowledge their opinions
| that the government uses its power poorly, that both
| political parties are primarily concerned with remaining in
| power, and so on.
|
| And then there's the group who wear t-shirts with "Camp
| Auschwitz 2021", "6 million wasn't enough". Signs that say "Q
| Sent Me". Hats with "Make America Great Again". These people
| are absolutely racist neo-nazis. These people are pretending
| to believe that Italians stole the election. There's no true
| belief here, no fundamentally held tenant other than "my side
| is better". This is not a small group - a YouGov poll puts it
| at 18% of Republicans. And this is Parler's user base, self-
| selected. The reasonable ones are still on Twitter.
| jonathanyc wrote:
| Yep. I was just trying to discuss with another user on this
| site who seriously claimed all conservatives have been
| banned from Twitter. I proposed a smorgasbord of
| conservatives who haven't been banned--George Bush
| (mainstream neoconservative), the Koch brothers (business
| libertarians or paleoconservatives), Ron Paul (moderate
| libertarian).
|
| Their response was that none of these were "true
| conservatives". Their proof was an article by the Cato
| Institute (brainchild of the Koch brothers, ironically)
| saying Bush was not a conservative. Well, duh, that's my
| point. A wide variety of conservatives with distinct
| ideologies have not been banned.
|
| None of these people have been banned. Why? Well they
| aren't creating mobs who storm the Capitol chanting that
| they want to lynch Mike Pence.
|
| Claiming Twitter is banning conservatives is flat out
| wrong. Twitter is banning _terrorists_ who assaulted our
| Capitol.
| nicwolff wrote:
| A propaganda weapon whose founder was just back from a trip to
| Russia with his Russian wife and whose parent company was
| incorporated by Giuliani's firm while he was traveling in
| Russia...
| https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1327253991936454663.html
| sillycon-valley wrote:
| How dare he have a Russian wife or travel.
|
| This is a perfect example of the conspiracies of the left.
|
| edit: downvote/flag all you want, the article he linked to is
| terribly written and makes giant leaps in logic.
|
| edit: dang shadowbanned me and not the conspiracy post above
| me. dang you are a 50cent super solider aren't you.
|
| how are we supposed to not talk about politics in a political
| post?
|
| half of the frontpage are political articles. 99% of the
| comments are political, what's wrong with mine?
|
| DONT ALLOW POLITICAL ARTICLES IF YOU DON'T WANT POLITICAL
| DISCUSSION
| dang wrote:
| It's against the rules to use this site primarily for
| ideological battle, and we ban accounts that do it,
| regardless of which ideology they're battling for. We have
| to, because it's the primary thing that destroys the
| curious conversation this site exists for.
|
| I've therefore banned this account. Please don't create
| accounts to break HN's rules with.
|
| Yes, the rules are just the same for the opposite
| ideological side.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| sillycon-valley wrote:
| You banned the account I replied to right? I was pointing
| out the conspiracy post...
|
| EDIT - because of rate limiting:
|
| I've posted in both technical articles and political
| articles.
|
| There have been a lot of political articles recently with
| the tech bans. I cannot help that.
|
| Most of my comments are about freedom of speech, not
| really a political ideology.
|
| I did not create an account to feed hellfire, I created
| an account to voice my opinion and debate from the other
| side because I see such one-sided arguments.
|
| This is why you have an echo-chamber.
| dang wrote:
| I looked at the other account's history the same way I
| looked at yours. The comment you replied to was not
| great, but the account certainly hasn't been abusing the
| site overall, while yours certainly has. If that
| assessment were the other way around, so would the ban
| be.
|
| Creating an account just to feed hellfire on HN is
| obviously a bannable offense--it's a way of killing what
| this site is supposed to exist for. We need an immune
| system against that. The immune system doesn't care what
| color the flames are.
| SergeAx wrote:
| How did you get from knowing about existing of moderation
| system to conclusion about using it to ensure ideological
| conformity? I don't see a "Wrong ideology" button on screenshot
| you've linked to.
| stuckindider wrote:
| Where are the comments about how awful it is for people's private
| messages to be leaked? Or is this okay because the media told me
| these guys are the bad guys.
| hehehaha wrote:
| We're you complaining when Snowden leaked? Or the Panama
| Papers?
| varvar wrote:
| It's amazing isn't it? Principles, ethics.. all talk for a lot
| of people, situations like these show it. Watch them spin it as
| a good thing for humanity as a whole. Amazing.
| marcinzm wrote:
| Which side are you talking about in this?
| A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote:
| I am reading this comment and I can't help but to chuckle.
| The reason I am saying is that can be read in several
| different ways and so does parent's post. We can just
| barely communicate with one another clearly so our proxy
| becomes 'who are you talking about exactly'.
|
| We need better communication tools -- language seems to be
| failing us.
| RIMR wrote:
| No. These guys ARE the bad guys. Not "because the media said
| so". They are objectively the bad guys.
|
| Parler's members are the rejects that couldn't survive on
| mainstream platforms due to their poor conduct. That userbase
| just planned and executed an attempt at insurrection against
| the US government.
|
| The market overwhelmingly has agreed that Parler violated
| ethical standards egregiously enough that severing business
| ties is appropriate.
|
| I fail to see the importance of these people's privacy in the
| wake of recent events. I also fail to have sympathy for people
| who trusted this hacked-together Twitter clone with their
| personal information.
|
| Leaking this information sends a clear message: Extremism and
| violence are intolerable, and every possible means is at our
| disposal to fight back against it. That includes exposing
| violent extremists to the light of day.
| cutitout wrote:
| > I fail to see the importance of these people's privacy in
| the wake of recent events. I also fail to have sympathy for
| people who trusted this hacked-together Twitter clone with
| their personal information.
|
| Then I fail to have any sympathy and solidarity with you.
| You're just another violent extremist in my eyes, and the
| enemy of my enemy is not my friend by a long shot.
| wpietri wrote:
| Where does it say private messages are being leaked?
| arbitrage wrote:
| A lot of this "what about their rights" bullshit is likely a
| covert misinformation campaign by botters and operatives.
|
| Hate speech is not protected. Plotting and committing treason
| against the United States government is not protected.
|
| Say unimaginably hateful shit, see how fast it takes to get
| punched in the mouth. Simple as that.
| cbozeman wrote:
| > Hate speech is not protected.
|
| Yes it is. The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that
| hate speech is legally protected free speech under the First
| Amendment. The most recent Supreme Court case on the issue
| was in 2017, when the justices unanimously reaffirmed that
| there is effectively no "hate speech" exception to the free
| speech rights protected by the First Amendment. [1]
|
| > Say unimaginably hateful shit, see how fast it takes to get
| punched in the mouth. Simple as that.
|
| This is incredibly dangerous and short-sighted. I can tell
| you've likely never been in a fight, or very, very few.
|
| People who think this way need to be _very_ fucking careful
| with their rhetoric here, because while they _think_ they
| might be the Billy Badass who 'll set the world 'right',
| there's a lot of other Billy Badasses out there who might
| just jerk a knot in their ass, either temporarily or
| permanently.
|
| You might want to take a more reasonable approach and figure
| out _why_ someone feels the way they feel first.
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech_in_the_United_
| Stat...
| MrMan wrote:
| i am really sad that hate speech is allowed in the US. i
| think it is shameful and dangerous. I have no comment on
| you telling that other guy to be very fucking careful
| MattGaiser wrote:
| The 2nd most upvoted comment is about that. The most is about
| how the Parler developers are inept.
| intended wrote:
| Sure they are bad guys.
|
| This was also a bad thing to do, since, presumably - some of it
| was intended to be private or hidden.
|
| It will be interesting to see what the results of the content
| are. There have been many arguments implying that parler was
| "pretty normal". We can now empirically find out.
|
| As others have noted, this is also a lesson in design and code
| priorities.
| Jedd wrote:
| Within 20m of this post being made, this <7d account is
| complaining about _other_ people not complaining about the leak
| of private messages, without actually complaining about that
| specific problem.
| avs733 wrote:
| most of us are trying to reflect on whether this is 'private
| messages' or 'evidence of crimes'
|
| I doubt anyone on HN would take seriously any other service
| turning over evidence of a crime to authorities because its
| 'private messages'. We might not like that it is there policy
| but we damn well would know it is their policy and not use
| services where it is technically possible to plan crimes?
| newacct583 wrote:
| > the media told me these guys are the bad guys.
|
| They sacked the capitol and cheered it on (yes, almost
| exclusively as far as the people on Parler are concerned).
|
| They are indeed the bad guys.
| caspper69 wrote:
| I arrived at that conclusion all on my own. Something a
| disappointingly large portion of Trump supporters seem to be
| unable to do. And last I checked, the _truth_ is that
| conservative media is a much larger slice of "the media" than
| it would have you believe, I mean, except when it touts its
| ratings to anyone who will listen.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| There are several comments top level saying exactly that. I'm
| not sure what else you want from HN.
|
| Honestly, the speculative and proactive accusations of
| hypocrisy are getting really tiresome. I wish people would
| stop.
| go13 wrote:
| I'm surprised to see how many people can not think for
| themselves but follow what media is telling them. I hope I
| don't do that myself but try to understand the matter and
| follow principles rather than sides.
|
| What I'm surprised the most is that with these complex and not
| obvious questions (at least to me) people without any shadow of
| a doubt are certain that it is right for big tech to censor
| Trump, shut down parler and take political sides like it
| happened.
|
| Maybe Trump is bad but at least i want to see his stupidity or
| his wrongdoing rather than other people to chew the news and
| feed me like im an infant.
|
| To me these questions require philosophical debates and
| dialogue (even with myself) to understand f it is right for a
| company to impose their political worldview on their clients -
| I don't feel it is right.
|
| But if others take these positions very easily, to me that is
| an indication that they got these ideas from somebody else
| rather than thought them through.
| ceilingcorner wrote:
| You are currently witnessing the result of defunding
| humanities in favor of technical education.
| BitwiseFool wrote:
| I have a feeling most of the professors in the Humanities
| departments would be not at all sympathetic to Parler or
| all the deplatforming happening around Donald Trump and his
| supporters. If anything they'd be broadcasting the Karl
| Popper "Paradox of Tolerance" as justification for
| everything that's been happening this week.
| ceilingcorner wrote:
| Humanities students do not and should not merely repeat
| their professors' opinions. To do so almost entirely
| misses the point of being educated.
| [deleted]
| MattGaiser wrote:
| The humanities departments are where the cheering of this
| is the loudest.
| A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote:
| I think "citation needed" is appropriate here. If we are
| bringing US education system into this conversation, the
| sheer number of humanities ( and the people they apparently
| teach ) suggests the opposite of what your post suggests.
|
| Dare I say, if more technical education was required, some
| of the issues in US could be, at least, ameliorated.
| ipsocannibal wrote:
| Remember to blame the media, right. It helps flood the zone
| with misleading accusations. Racist fascists attacking a
| democratic institution while calling for blood are objectively
| bad guys. Full stop. If any of their private messages were used
| in planning and execution of that crime that is evidence on
| which they should be charged. That evidence will mostly be made
| public in the course of a trial. Everything else just delete.
| ibrault wrote:
| Everything that was "hacked" is just publicly-available
| information on Parler that was archived:
| https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1348666166978424832
| ulfw wrote:
| "the media told me these guys are the bad guys"
|
| and what do you think they are?
| TameAntelope wrote:
| I'm willing to own my belief these people are bad guys, no need
| to protect me by saying the media told me so.
| cbozeman wrote:
| If you think every person on Parler is a bad person, you're
| mentally deranged, period.
| boredumb wrote:
| Just call everyone a terrorist and absolve your soul of any
| uneasiness you have with this. Surely this hyperbole hasn't
| been used in recent history to push authoritarian and unethical
| measures by state and private actors paving a golden road to
| hell.
| racl101 wrote:
| Yeah, this precedent is very troubling to say the least. If
| or when things swing the other way, this will not go well for
| everybody.
| [deleted]
| deegles wrote:
| Umm I'm not sure which group you're referring to!
| stronglikedan wrote:
| Are they distinguishable by their terroristic activities
| alone?
| _red wrote:
| Its also complete accident that there is now a 20000 page
| "Patriot Act 2.0" being pushed as a solution.
| boredumb wrote:
| The US Political class is just that good!
| ipsocannibal wrote:
| Links or is this FUD.
| sonotmyname wrote:
| Perhaps GlobalProtect was referring to HR 4192?
|
| https://www.aclu.org/letter/aclu-statement-opposing-
| hr-4192-...
| dmead wrote:
| A bunch of assholes on here are trying to destabilize the
| country. what are you even on about?
| tw04 wrote:
| The amount of victimization through projection currently
| taking place is kind of shocking. I don't know of a single
| person that has been called a Terrorist for anything other
| than calling for violence against others. Why self-proclaimed
| "peaceful" conservatives continue to lump themselves in with
| white-supremacists and domestic terrorists is beyond me.
|
| You can pretend that people are being persecuted for being a
| Republican but 30 seconds of fact checking will disprove
| that. In fact the only ones calling for violence against
| Republicans are those very same white supremacists and
| domestic terrorists because it seems that anyone that doesn't
| align with Donald Trump is somehow not a conservative. Mike
| Pence isn't a Republican? Really? I can't think of a
| politician much further right, and somehow he's no longer
| acceptable.
|
| If your political belief system is "whatever Trump thinks
| this week" then maybe it's time to re-evaluate what you
| really stand for.
| refurb wrote:
| What I love about this comment is how politically ambiguous
| it is. You cant tell which "side" it's arguing for which is
| exactly the point - the same argument can be used by both
| sides. That's what makes it so dangerous.
| simonh wrote:
| It's trying to equate calling out actual terrorist acts
| carried by self-identified insurrectionists, with calling
| "Everyone" a terrorist.
|
| No, we're not calling everyone a terrorist. Not even
| everyone on Parler, though clearly some were, and the
| service rules were set up to facilitate them planning their
| atrocities. We're calling these terrorists what they are.
| Pipe bombs and a dead policeman for goodness sake.
|
| Where do we draw the line?
| libraryatnight wrote:
| ...these people are the authoritarians. They want to usher in
| some sort of bizarre "law and order" where they define what
| those things mean. They were literally beating police offers
| and saying "we're on your side" at the same time.
| ipsocannibal wrote:
| Well what is your suggested response? I think the lack of
| calling out terrorism and fascism in this country have
| already resulted four years of "pushing authoritarian and
| unethical measures" by the US executive.
| ErikVandeWater wrote:
| '"pushing authoritarian and unethical measures" by the US
| executive' has gone on _much_ longer than 4 years.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| The response should be to pass $2k relief checks.
| sb057 wrote:
| >Well what is your suggested response?
|
| If someone is committing crimes, then arrest and prosecute
| them.
| [deleted]
| mr_overalls wrote:
| > media told me
|
| I create a Parler account myself out of curiosity's sake. The
| platform had basically no moderation, and was rife with open
| calls to violence. It was absolutely serving as a recruitment &
| coordination site for domestic terrorism.
| astrea wrote:
| Didn't we learn from 4/8chan that letting people post
| whatever they want (semi-)anonymously leads to disgusting
| behavior?
| foolfoolz wrote:
| reddit is the same thing. not all of 4chan is bad. not all
| of reddit is bad. but there is bad on both. it has nothing
| to do with the website it's the format
| dvlsg wrote:
| The difference is that reddit at least tries to moderate
| calls to violence and hate speech.
|
| They don't always do a good job of it, though.
| andrewzah wrote:
| AFAIK 4chan is also moderated to an extent, which is what
| lead to 8chan/others.
| foolfoolz wrote:
| 4chan is moderated
| kache_ wrote:
| People cannot post whatever they want on 4chan. On boards
| such as /g/, and /sci/, any off topic discussion is banned,
| including blatantly racist content. Other than that, there
| is free discussion that can be quite enlightening. And just
| because you choose to use a website does not mean you agree
| with the fringes. Just because you're a reddit user, and
| reddit has gore subreddits, are you into gore?
| astrea wrote:
| You make 4chan sounds like a utopia. Clearly you've never
| seen the revenge porn, gore, doxxing, etc that happens
| (or at least used to happen, havent been there in years)
| on b/.
| kache_ wrote:
| why the hell would anyone go on /b/? Same reason no one
| goes to reddit/r/nsfl
|
| And honestly, 4chan really is a utopia compared to orange
| reddit. Removing identities makes conversations less
| about how the individual appears and more about the
| substance of the topic.
| adnzzzzZ wrote:
| This thread is talking about an example of doxxing on a
| much larger scale than anything that has ever happened on
| 4chan. What's your point?
| abvdasker wrote:
| I think it's also that unmoderated forums become a magnet
| for people who want to spew hate, rather than anonymity
| inherently leading regular people into such behavior
| (though maybe the former causes some of the latter).
| DaiPlusPlus wrote:
| Older than that, here's a take from 2004:
| https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19
| tomatotomato37 wrote:
| The whole reason 8chan was created was because they were
| kicked off of 4chan for disgusting behavior (specifically
| doxing/harassing game journalists)
| foob wrote:
| And now information about your account has been leaked, and
| will be lumped in with more nefarious accounts. I have a
| feeling that a significant number of people have similarly
| made accounts out of curiosity. I've had my parents and some
| less technically inclined friends recently ask me what Parler
| is because it's been in the news. These aren't people that
| fall under the alt-right categorization in the slightest, and
| they're also not people who would think to use fake
| information if they were signing up for something to see what
| it is like.
|
| Even if the platform had terrible and dangerous content on
| it, we should avoid assuming that everybody on it supported
| that content, and we shouldn't celebrate their personal
| information being leaked.
| mr_overalls wrote:
| I don't care if my personal information was leaked. I
| followed discussions, posted a comment or two like, "What
| evidence do you have for that?" There seemed to be tons of
| other accounts that did the same, along with accounts by
| obvious Lefts who were there to troll. I highly doubt there
| will be blowback for the kind of participation I did.
|
| I am absolutely a privacy advocate. However, in the case
| where the continued existence of our democracy hinges on
| rooting out violent domestic terrorists, I am willing to
| make tradeoffs. At this point, you should think about
| Parler as a jihadi forum for rednecks.
| MrMan wrote:
| i think we are post-privacy.
|
| we need compassion to restrain ourselves from harming
| others
|
| but I dont think anyone can expect to hide from anyone
| else on this rock at this point.
| mleonhard wrote:
| I don't understand your claim that terrorists are a
| threat to our democracy. As long as most of the people in
| the country believe in democracy, the country will
| continue to have democracy.
|
| The real threat to democracy is allowing leaders to stop
| following the democratic process. For example, on
| 02021-01-06, 147 congresspeople voted to throw out the
| votes from an entire state, even after their party had
| pursued the appropriate legal remedies [0]. Next time,
| they may succeed in throwing out votes. At that point,
| USA will be an oligarchy. This is the real threat to
| democracy.
|
| [0] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/01/07/us/ele
| ctions/...
| no-s wrote:
| >>147 congresspeople voted to throw out the votes from an
| entire state, even after their party had pursued the
| appropriate legal remedies
|
| Hey wait, they had the opportunity to vote their
| conscience on it? Does that mean they were
| Constitutionally empowered to raise and decide the
| question?
|
| The USA is a republic, and explicitly not a democracy,
| said status having been debated early on and pure
| democracy was found seriously wanting in the qualities
| needed for a just and lasting society of free people.
| mleonhard wrote:
| No. The constitution does not allow them to throw out
| votes.
|
| A republic is a form of democracy. Arguing semantics has
| no place in HN.
|
| And "vote their conscience" is a weasel phrase. They had
| a duty to tally the votes, a procedure to follow. Some of
| them didn't want to follow the procedure. Changing the
| procedure requires a constitutional amendment, agreement
| from a supermajority of states. Regardless of their
| individual thoughts on the matter, the laws of the land
| do not allow them to vote to disregard the law.
| MrMan wrote:
| if the mass killings that right wing people want, come to
| pass, that for me would be a loss equal to "threat to
| democracy"
| macintux wrote:
| Those Congresspeople were responding to, and enabling,
| the same terrorists. These are not two separate
| discussions.
| mleonhard wrote:
| Can you please explain how they were enabling the
| terrorists? Did the congresspeople get the Capitol Police
| to stand down? Even if they did, that is a separate thing
| from throwing out votes.
|
| The country could have terrorist acts every day and still
| have democracy. Our congresspeople could have their
| meetings in an underground bunker, wear body armor all
| the time, and travel in armored vehicles, and it would
| still be democracy. Democracy means the people decide who
| has power.
|
| Terrorists can use violence and may change some people
| minds, but they cannot destroy our democracy. Democracy
| exists in the minds of US voters.
| mr_overalls wrote:
| At this time, it's becoming clear that the GOP
| establishment is in favor of de facto one-party rule.
| They are seeking to overturn the results of a democratic
| election, and many of them are encouraging voter
| disenfranchisement and even stochastic terrorism to
| retain their grip on power.
| hannasanarion wrote:
| Lauren Boebert was livetweeting the location of Pence and
| Pelosi so that the mob could "get her".
| mleonhard wrote:
| That crime is separate from trying to throw out votes.
| nilkn wrote:
| And now there are folks right here in this thread who will
| assume the absolute worst about you and try to ruin your
| life. I wish you the best of luck in surviving this. This is
| why it's not reasonable to paint every account there as that
| of a terrorist.
| hchz wrote:
| They don't need to assume, because they will have your
| private messages and posts.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Why would they? Because he did nothing? Or because he was
| 'present'? Accounts that monitor something are not going to
| run with the crowd in their act. See also: the historian
| who documented a lot of the mayhem on the 6th from inside
| the crowd.
| nilkn wrote:
| Because they're not going to investigate all 4+ million
| Parler accounts to distinguish between those involved and
| those not. Many folks here are just assuming everyone on
| Parler was a terrorist or complicit in what happened. The
| poster's name and phone number are now lumped in with
| everyone else's. All we can hope is they made the effort
| to use fake information.
| jacquesm wrote:
| I'd hope it would take a bit more than 'present' to be
| handed a sentence. But time will tell.
| evgen wrote:
| No one will be judged for having an account, because a
| lot of people were signed up just to monitor and watch.
| It is trivial to claim that you only signed up for that
| reason and to expect the claim to stick. If you happened
| to be frequently posting the chronicles of the elders of
| zion or talking about how you wanted to pursue an ammo
| box solution to a ballot box loss then you are going to
| have a lot more explaining to do.
| nilkn wrote:
| I definitely hope that your analysis here is the
| prevailing one.
| cbozeman wrote:
| > No one will be judged for having an account, because a
| lot of people were signed up just to monitor and watch.
|
| Just like certain subreddits weren't banning people just
| for having posted in certain other subreddits, _even if
| those posts were opposition posts_ , right?
|
| I think you need to read more Jonathan Haidt, because
| research shows you're flat out wrong about this.
| InitialLastName wrote:
| I've been seeing a lot of people claiming to have been in
| the Capitol (with the crowd) in a "journalism" capacity
| who also seem to spend the rest of their time openly and
| vocally supporting the conspiracy theories and groups
| that led to the riot. I've become very torn between the
| dual ideas that a) it's important for people to be
| covering these things and b) by nature of a protest,
| those people being in the crowd are tacitly (or openly)
| contributing their voices to that movement.
| nilkn wrote:
| I think there's a difference between physically showing
| up at the Capitol during that event and being present for
| the whole thing (even if not entering the Capitol) versus
| just having an account on a site where some planning for
| the event took place. It seems to me that it would've
| been quite possible for a casual user of Parler -- or
| someone like the above poster who signed up as an
| observer -- to not even be aware of said planning. For
| instance, I'm pretty sure I have some family members who
| created Parler accounts in the past, and yet they called
| me up asking me what was going on at the Capitol and why,
| suggesting they were just as surprised/shocked as
| everyone else.
|
| I think folks here are underestimating how many people
| just viewed Parler as a right-leaning Twitter and didn't
| realize how far some corners of it had went or were
| going.
| Veen wrote:
| Then you should be worried because your employer and family
| may discover that you were a member of Parler. The "I was
| just curious" defence might not be as convincing as you
| think.
| cbozeman wrote:
| LOL, this is as ridiculous as, "You were once handed a
| leaflet about the Nazi Party in 1937, therefore you are a
| Nazi."
|
| If we don't move past this kind of absolute nonsense, you
| really _will_ have a violent confrontation on your hands,
| because you 're going to end up alienating millions.
| UncleMeat wrote:
| _Most_ of the top level comments are mentioning that.
| traveler01 wrote:
| Yeah this is plain retarded and I see too many people cheering
| this up. And mostly many of these users are not even Trump
| supporters and are having their data leaked.
|
| Where people have their brains nowadays...?
| nkrisc wrote:
| I'm not gonna lie: I find it very difficult to be upset by this
| when the site was a haven for people who want to mass
| executions for people like me. For me, the world is a little
| more complex than "privacy at all costs." It's hard to decide
| where to draw the line.
| fasdf1122 wrote:
| orange man bad
| LunaSea wrote:
| I would set the line at "following due process".
| tedjdziuba wrote:
| Twitter is a haven for the "kill all white people" and
| "Republicans all deserve to die" supporters.
| sn wrote:
| I also fall in the category of parler "was a haven for people
| who want mass executions for people like me."
|
| I still think it's wrong to leak the data.
|
| Many of these people use twitter and gmail too - does that
| justify a leak from those services? If not, why not?
|
| There were and are legal means for law enforcement to access
| that data if they need to.
| nkrisc wrote:
| For what it's worth, I don't think that it is ok. I'm just
| acknowledging the conflict of feeling bad for innocents
| caught up in this and being glad that some real bad actors
| might be exposed.
| sanedigital wrote:
| Talk about hyperbole. In no way did even 1% of the population
| on Parler want mass executions for people like you.
| nfRfqX5n wrote:
| here's nearly 1% of (4mm estimated active) upvoting
| something similar though: /r/ParlerWatch/comments/ktwmje/th
| is_is_the_type_of_free_speech_parler_accepts/
| sanedigital wrote:
| That statement--while absolutely and undeniably abhorrent
| --is not even remotely calling for mass executions, or
| even mass violence, against anybody.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| But for the people that _did_ , it was absolutely a haven.
| makeworld wrote:
| How do you know?
| adrr wrote:
| We have the data. That would be easy to prove what
| percentage of active users called for violence both in
| public and private messages.
| muspimerol wrote:
| There's no hyperbole in the comment. It can still be a safe
| haven for extremists even if most of the users are not.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| Should we still have due process in the external world?
| After all, the United States is a "safe haven" for people
| who talk about killing pretty much every minority group
| under the sun.
|
| > the world is a little more complex than "privacy at all
| costs."
|
| The line doesn't have to do with the infringement of
| privacy, it's about whether that infringement is being
| done by publicly sanctioned power, or the whim of the
| arbitrary, domineering power of private (tech) actors.
| Elizabeth Anderson has written quite well on this topic
| in "Private Government."
| [deleted]
| sanedigital wrote:
| That applies equally to the rest of the internet.
| estomagordo wrote:
| So let's start by looking at Hacker News. Where on HN can
| we see people plotting mass executions like that?
| dx87 wrote:
| In the initial post about the Capitol being shut down,t
| here were people saying that everyone who broke into the
| capitol building needed to be tried for treason and
| executed, or saying that the police should have opened
| fire and killed anyone who broke in. The mods removed the
| comments, but HN isn't some paragon of virtue that isn't
| susceptible to the same calls for violence as any other
| site.
| wetmore wrote:
| Mods removing those comments sort of proves that HN isn't
| a safe haven for the calls for violence.
| sanedigital wrote:
| Those comments and posts are removed from Parler as well:
| https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/09/politics/parler-lin-
| wood-...
| muspimerol wrote:
| No, not really. It comes down to how you define "safe
| haven" - if violent groups are actively moderated and
| banned, then I don't think it can be called a safe haven.
| How does the rest of the internet equate to Parler in
| this respect?
| simonh wrote:
| An even if they didn't agree with the sentiment, many or
| even most of those on the platform were perfectly happy
| to fraternise with those that did.
| [deleted]
| nkrisc wrote:
| I don't know what people think, we can't read their minds.
| All I know is if you wanted to find people who want mass
| executions in the US, Parler would be a safe place to find
| them, based on what we _do_ know about them.
| cbozeman wrote:
| What are "people like you"?
|
| Facebook and Twitter have millions of people who want
| mass executions for all kinds of groups, a quick trip
| into Muslim areas of both services and you'll find
| moderate and right-wing versions that want execution for
| LGBTQ+ people. You can find the same desire for
| marginalization and extermination of other groups. Not
| every language and dialect has a huge team of moderators
| that review content and take the appropriate punitive
| action against malicious users.
|
| I have a Parler account. I have a GAB account. I make
| accounts on all new social media platforms and
| communications services. Everyone should. Because you
| have no idea what platform might be the next Facebook, or
| which one is going to be the next MySpace.
| ipsocannibal wrote:
| Data, evidence? The threat is in giving the fascist
| terrorist 1% a microphone not that the other 99% happen to
| be listening. Parler was lax in policing that 1%.
| sanedigital wrote:
| I'm not the one making the positive claim: if people are
| so certain there were calls for mass executions on
| Parler, they should demonstrate it.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| And thus the private messages/videos of all should be
| leaked by vigilantes?
|
| I am equally concerned about what happened about the
| Capitol, but the actions taken by tech in response are
| unacceptable to me.
| brigandish wrote:
| > The threat is in giving the fascist terrorist 1% a
| microphone
|
| The problem with fascist terrorists is not their
| rhetoric, it's their violence. Allow them to speak their
| mind and you lower their need for violent action and
| everyone else gets to show that their ideas are horribly
| flawed.
|
| It's amusing to think that people seriously believe there
| are huge swathes of people just ripe to become neo-nazis
| because someone gave a rousing speech or wrote some
| tweets - how do you manage not to succumb to these
| _rhetorical titans_?
| marcinzm wrote:
| >It's amusing to think that people seriously believe
| there are huge swathes of people just ripe to become neo-
| nazis because someone gave a rousing speech or wrote some
| tweets - how do you manage not to succumb to these
| rhetorical titans?
|
| Given that exactly this happened 90 years ago and caused
| the deaths of tens of millions, people are needless to
| say cautious.
| cbozeman wrote:
| You can't have Hitler without the Treaty of Versailles.
| He was just a catalyst to an incredibly punitive and
| emasculating treaty that scarred the psychology of the
| German people.
|
| If it hadn't been Hitler, it would have eventually been
| someone else.
| macintux wrote:
| War, maybe. Genocide of the Jews? Seems less likely as an
| inevitability.
| brigandish wrote:
| I'm going to side with the interpretations of history
| that are a tad more complex than "he gave a rousing
| speech, hence, genocide", and there are plenty of them.
| l9k wrote:
| Yet you seem to side with the less complex interpretation
| of current event being "he gave a rousing speech"
| mrzimmerman wrote:
| You're purposefully being reductionist about this. People
| having their brains hit with racist or violent rhetoric
| over a long period of time will be changed by that. They
| human brain adapts to it's environment, expecting certain
| inputs and if it's receiving /pol light on Twitter then
| it starts to expect it.
|
| On top of that, it's only a matter of time before they're
| linked to one of the many .win site that sprang up after
| Twitter purged the_donald and the Qanon people.
|
| And again, people have been moved to violence and facism
| in human history, that's not difficult to find.
| cbozeman wrote:
| There's a huge degree of just outright horseshit here.
|
| I've been browsing /pol/ for years, hell almost decades.
| Its a great place to go to get an idea of just how fringe
| certain elements of society are becoming. I was actually
| actively _browsing_ when QAnon was making his posts
| there.
|
| I thought they were just as ridiculous and far-fetched
| then as I do now. People become radicalized _largely_
| because some condition in their life is lacking. For
| every single successful mechanical engineer that joins
| ISIS, there 's 99 out-of-work coal miners and factory
| workers who storm the American capital.
|
| Most people who have everything in their life going great
| don't end up extremists.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| I doubt most of the people who stormed the Capitol were
| out of work coal miners and factory workers. Which is not
| to say they didn't have things going badly in their
| lives, that describes a lot of people.
| brigandish wrote:
| > You're purposefully being reductionist about this.
|
| I'm really not, and I'd prefer if you started off
| responding to me by not (mis)characterising my
| intentions. I'm 100% sincere in my support of free speech
| and stand 100% behind my comment.
|
| > People having their brains hit with racist or violent
| rhetoric over a long period of time will be changed by
| that
|
| Yes, they will, which is why it's good to allow every
| voice and every kind of viewpoint a chance to be
| expressed and hence _challenged_. Unless you think that
| echo chambers are a good thing?
|
| > people have been moved to violence and facism in human
| history, that's not difficult to find
|
| Did they occur in places with high amounts of censorship
| or free speech? The Holocaust wasn't caused simply by one
| of Hitler's speeches, for example, it was also (among
| other things) primed by the rampant anti-semitic
| prejudice that came from the pulpit every Sunday for
| hundreds of years - which was _unchallengable due to
| blasphemy laws_.
|
| Another "win" for the repression of speech someone in
| power doesn't like, eh?
| joshuamorton wrote:
| Parler was an echo chamber.
|
| > which was unchallengable due to blasphemy laws
|
| There's basically no support for this claim in any
| literature I can find. Care to cite a historian?
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| > Allow them to speak their mind and you lower their need
| for violent action
|
| That may be true, or that may not be true. Has there been
| any research on this?
| loveistheanswer wrote:
| History is replete with examples
| VikingCoder wrote:
| According to Wikipedia, there are 4,000,000 active Parler
| users.
|
| You think you can assert with confidence that there are not
| 40,000 people with Parler accounts who want mass
| executions?
|
| I'd like to think you're right, but I'm not as confident as
| you are.
|
| Not after watching someone beat a Capitol Police officer to
| death with a flag pole flying the American Flag. People
| think they are defending their country against evil. Like
| me, apparently.
|
| How many QAnon followers are there? How many believe the
| most outrageous claims? I would not be surprised if 40,000
| do. Would you?
| Anon1096 wrote:
| FWIW Wikipedia lists that number of users as of November
| 2020. It had a huge influx of users in December and
| obviously January, to the point that it was number 1 in
| the App Store before it got pulled. So the 4MM user
| number is probably very off.
| sanedigital wrote:
| The data is public now--if you're so certain, go find me
| a single post on Parler calling for mass executions.
| VikingCoder wrote:
| > The data is public now--if you're so certain, go find
| me a single post on Parler calling for mass executions.
|
| Easily done:
|
| https://imgur.com/gallery/nHb2lO8
|
| Some of these are Verified users - Parler has their
| Drivers License and Social Security number, and yet they
| still felt secure in brazenly violating the law like
| this.
| sanedigital wrote:
| Sorry, I should have clarified: find me a post that
| wasn't moderated away. Lin Wood's post was:
| https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/09/politics/parler-lin-
| wood-...
|
| Unfortunately the service is down, but I would imagine
| that other post was removed as well.
| VikingCoder wrote:
| No, I do not accept that you are "clarifying." You are
| intentionally moving the goal-posts.
|
| The question we were discussing was whether or not many
| of the USERS are calling for mass executions.
|
| I provided ample evidence, despite your "find me a single
| post" challenge.
|
| Now we might want to engage in a different discussion,
| about whether Parler was correctly moderating that
| content. But that is not a "clarification," that's a new
| topic.
|
| I do not have access to information about how long
| content was allowed to remain before it was removed. Do
| you?
| wool_gather wrote:
| Hey, spoiler alert for people regarding that link --
| there's some _very_ strong, graphically violent language.
| Don 't click if you're not in a good head space at the
| moment.
| MrMan wrote:
| i think its good to see it so people understand that
| there are literally millions of other americans that
| actively want them dead
| VikingCoder wrote:
| I pushed back in one direction, and now I'll push back in
| the other.
|
| I do not think "literally millions" do. That is an
| extraordinary claim requiring extraordinary evidence.
|
| I am saddened by extremists like this, on all sides.
|
| I want to win a tough but fair political fight, and I
| think that's what almost everyone in America wants, too.
| I'm sorry some people think 60 court cases were
| simultaneously wrongly decided, but I don't feel sympathy
| for anyone who thinks the next step is to storm the
| Capitol.
| wool_gather wrote:
| I didn't say it shouldn't be posted; just a warning to be
| prepared for what you're going to see.
| mittermayr wrote:
| Since a "single post" has been provided by someone now,
| it would be nice to see you give them the decency and
| acknowledge it. There are so many comments here, and they
| all read in the same way, "well, what about..." and "show
| me proof" -- only for someone to actually go and spend
| the time to respond, and then be ignored quietly.
| Discussions here (political ones) feel so childish, I
| wish we'd be better as a community on those.
| sanedigital wrote:
| I have. I don't typically sit on HN and refresh my own
| comments to see people responding in real time.
| marcinzm wrote:
| Personally, when I discuss politics online I don't expect
| the other person to acknowledge anything. My audience is
| all the people on the fence lurking and reading and
| forming opinions on the topic.
| wool_gather wrote:
| Yes. In many cases, the only "winning" move is to say
| what you have to say and then step back.
|
| You can't usually "win" the argument, just your own time.
| VikingCoder wrote:
| Agreed.
|
| I will admit that it's draining, talking to one user who
| keeps moving the goal-posts.
|
| And I will then say that I think it's their intention to
| drain people like me.
|
| So I try to shrug it off and keep refuting arguments with
| the evidence they pretend they will be convinced by.
| esperent wrote:
| As one (non-American) lurker who is reading this thread
| to try and get a handle on just what the hell is going on
| over there, thank you for putting the energy in, and
| please don't give up.
|
| It's clear that you are arguing in good faith and the
| other person who keeps moving the goalposts and demanding
| more proof is not, and moreover it's very enlightening to
| see this scenarios played out nearly identically whenever
| I lurk and follow a discussion between the left and right
| in US politics.
| marcinzm wrote:
| Unfortunately, irrational behavior applies to both sides
| but on different issues. I saw it first hand in terms of
| COVID and my liberal friends. They took the most negative
| possible outlook and then called you an unscientific
| idiot if you didn't think it was the only possible
| outcome. COVID has a 5% mortality rate (even when
| reasonable data indicated 0.5%). A vaccine is impossible
| (even when multiple companies said they had promising
| candidates). Immunity doesn't exist (even when everything
| except a few reports said it did). And so on.
| marcinzm wrote:
| https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/09/us/arkansas-police-
| resign...
| hartator wrote:
| These are not credible death threats.
| marcinzm wrote:
| The following was requested and provided, please stop
| changing the goal post when you're called out.
|
| > single post
|
| > on Parler
|
| > calling for mass executions
| hartator wrote:
| You're replying to someone else.
|
| I still think these are not legit death threats by the
| content of it. Saying things like "a good commie is a
| dead a commie" might be tasteless but it's far from being
| a serious thing. No one is killing communists in the US.
| gregmac wrote:
| > "Will you and several hundred more go with me to D.C.
| and fight our way into the Congress and arrest every
| Democrat who has participated in this coup?" [Marshall,
| Arkansas Police] Chief Lang Holland posted Friday on
| Parler, a right-wing messaging site. "We may have to
| shoot and kill many of the Communist B.L.M. and ANTIFA
| Democrat foot soldiers to accomplish this!!!"
|
| > "Death to all Marxist Democrats. Take no prisoners
| leave no survivors!!" Chief Holland added.
|
| How would this have to be modified to become a
| "legitimate death threat"?
| esperent wrote:
| For anybody reasonable? Not at all.
| VikingCoder wrote:
| I'm not sure if you saw my reply on a separate part of
| this thread:
|
| https://imgur.com/gallery/nHb2lO8
|
| Those are legit death threats. Including from a lawyer
| associated with the President.
| tw04 wrote:
| I hear this a lot, but it makes no logical sense to me. I
| see a site that is (in)famous for being full of self-
| proclaimed right-wing "patriots" who are calling for
| violence against people due to political beliefs.
|
| Someone then decide to associate with these people by
| joining the site. They may not personally post messages
| calling for violence, but are now associated with them. And
| the response is: well sure I'm in the group but I don't
| actually agree with any of this.
|
| Then my question is: why did you join in the first place?
| If you don't agree with the most vocal 1% (I SERIOUSLY
| doubt that number after spending time perusing the site),
| and you don't denounce what they're saying, what do you
| expect others to think? We're supposed to read your mind
| that you're part of a "silent dissent" and just joined the
| site because...?
|
| People were banned from facebook and twitter for calling
| for violence, if you switched sites specifically to follow
| that person I have a REAL tough time believing you don't
| support them.
| sanedigital wrote:
| Have to been on Reddit, specifically /r/politics? There
| are calls to violence _all the time_. Nobody bats an eye
| because it 's calls to violence against the "bad guys."
| tw04 wrote:
| I assume you've got some citations for that, right? I
| have been to r/politics and people get banned pretty
| quickly for calling for violence. I just went through the
| top 20 threads, and there isn't a single call for
| violence to be found.
| brandmeyer wrote:
| Indeed. When evaluating reddit threads and content, its
| important to distinguish between highly upvoted and
| visible content, and content that was downvoted or
| deleted to oblivion. A -1000 call for violence in one
| subreddit is not equivalent to a +1000 call for violence
| in another.
| sanedigital wrote:
| Parler is banning those posts as well:
| https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/09/politics/parler-lin-
| wood-... The point is that there are bad actors and bad
| voices across these platforms, including those that are
| "okay" like Reddit, Facebook, and Twitter.
| tw04 wrote:
| But they aren't. You can go there right now and find
| posts calling for violence. They have no automated system
| and have no plans to implement one which is why they were
| kicked off AWS. From the AWS letter they were kind enough
| to post:
|
| >Recently, we've seen a steady increase in this violent
| content on your website, all of which violates our terms.
| It's clear that Parler does not have an effective process
| to comply with the AWS terms of service. It also seems
| that Parler is still trying to determine its position on
| content moderation. You remove some violent content when
| contacted by us or others, but not always with urgency.
| Your CEO recently stated publicly that he doesn't "feel
| responsible for any of this, and neither should the
| platform." This morning, you shared that you have a plan
| to more proactively moderate violent content, but plan to
| do so manually with volunteers. It's our view that this
| nascent plan to use volunteers to promptly identify and
| remove dangerous content will not work in light of the
| rapidly growing number of violent posts. This is further
| demonstrated by the fact that you still have not taken
| down much of the content that we've sent you. Given the
| unfortunate events that transpired this past week in
| Washington, D.C., there is serious risk that this type of
| content will further incite violence.
| sanedigital wrote:
| Except you can't go there now, because it's been pulled
| from AWS.
| themaninthedark wrote:
| I am not going to go through and find some examples but
| there have been calls for violence there. I remember the
| entire Sandman period of time with many people saying he
| "what a punchable face"....
|
| Edit to add: Also what happens behind doors on invite
| only subreddits?
|
| Edit to add further: https://www.reddit.com/r/ShitPolitic
| sSays/comments/bmtdqb/ch...
|
| CHapoTrapHouse got banned but....CTH is invite only.
| evgen wrote:
| There is a German saying that goes something like "if
| there's a Nazi at the table and 10 other people sitting
| there talking to him, you've got a table with 11 Nazis."
| [deleted]
| cbozeman wrote:
| A saying from a nation with collective psychological
| trauma of over 100 years. No thanks.
|
| That's an idiotic saying. The person's comment above you
| is also idiotic.
|
| When Twitter is banning feminist women for saying
| something as so patently obvious as, "Men are not women."
| [1] then don't be surprised when people choose to make
| accounts at any available social media service because 1)
| people aren't creating blogs that get 100 million
| visitors anymore (if such blogs _ever_ existed) and 2) no
| one has any idea which social media platform will become
| the next 3 billion user juggernaut and which one will be
| converted into a shitty music-focused platform.
|
| [1]: Meghan Murphy, banned in 2018 for "hateful conduct"
| following a heated exchange which involved misgendering a
| transgender woman. The fact that someone could be banned
| for fucking _misgendering_ someone indicates just how
| pathetic our society has become. These services have a
| block button, and apparently no one knows how to use it.
| lern_too_spel wrote:
| Twitter had a policy against misgendering and had locked
| her out of her account several times before banning her.
| If this is something Meghan thinks is worth getting
| banned over, that's on her. Most people just don't care
| what pronoun somebody wants to be called, so the non-
| asshole thing to do is to just use their preferred
| pronoun.
| cbozeman wrote:
| > so the non-asshole thing to do is to just use their
| preferred pronoun.
|
| I agree. I completely agree. I myself call the
| transgender people in my life by their preferred pronoun.
|
| I also find compelling someone's speech by threat of
| banning them to be disgusting. Especially when there's a
| block button available. If you don't like what someone's
| saying, you can literally ignore everything they say.
|
| Herein lies the conundrum for me - for, what seems to be,
| an increasingly large group of people, its not enough to
| simply stop interaction with people they don't like,
| those people have to be _removed from the landscape
| altogether_. I just do not see this ending in any
| positive way.
| lern_too_spel wrote:
| Blocking does not scale if you interact with a lot of
| people (see many famous examples of celebrities quitting
| Twitter over harrassment), which is something Twitter
| would obviously want its users to do. To make it easier,
| it makes absolute sense to me for Twitter to enforce
| clearly defined civility rules.
| cbozeman wrote:
| > Blocking does not scale if you interact with a lot of
| people (see many famous examples of celebrities quitting
| Twitter over harrassment), which is something Twitter
| would obviously want its users to do.
|
| This seems to be viewed as a sort of "bug" of scale; I
| see it as a feature. If you become extremely popular and
| your voice is amplified, you're going to have to contend
| with being criticized and scrutinized to a greater
| degree.
|
| I fall into the Sam Harris & Joe Rogan Greater Internet
| Reply Theory: "Don't read the comments. You can't read
| the comments." Jamie Foxx said it best on why you don't
| need to read them, "Sometimes the comments'll get in that
| ass."
|
| I will simply never agree with removing someone for the
| content of their speech. I do think that you eventually
| reach a point of harassment (for example, if you reply to
| every single tweet of someone you don't like with,
| "You're a cunt."), but by-and-large, a lot of the
| "problems" simply result in people not being able to
| ignore others, either by using a button on a website, or
| just by sheer willpower of not looking at a comment.
| joshuamorton wrote:
| Her speech was not compelled. She was removed from
| twitter. She wasn't unpersoned. She isn't in a gulag.
| Stop hyperbolizing and your concerns get a lot less
| concerning.
| cbozeman wrote:
| > Her speech was not compelled.
|
| "Don't say this thing, or we'll ban you forever from the
| platform."
|
| If I walk up to you and say, "Don't say this thing, or me
| and my 9 associates here will punch you in the face,"
| that's compulsion. Period.
| [deleted]
| joshuamorton wrote:
| That you're equating being removed from twitter with
| being physically threatened is telling. They aren't
| comparable. A physical I threat of violence is
| compelling, yes, in a way that being removed from a
| website _isn 't_. She could post the same thing on HN,
| right now. So compelling!
| cbozeman wrote:
| Good. It _should_ be telling. I 'm all-in on free speech.
| I support the right of everyone, anywhere, to say
| whatever they want, whenever they want, as long as it
| adheres to the First Amendment.
|
| Chomsky said it best: "If you're really in favor of free
| speech, then you're in favor of freedom of speech for
| precisely the views you despise. Otherwise, you're not in
| favor of free speech."
| joshuamorton wrote:
| And you're welcome to hold that view. But conflating
| threats with 1st amendment protected action is dumb.
|
| And yes, Twitter, under the first amendment, is free to
| associate with whomever they want (or to refuse to
| associate with them)! Twitter isn't compelling Meghan
| Murphy to do anything anymore than than twitter is, at
| this moment, compelling me to give them my wallet.
|
| On the other hand, if you said "Give me your wallet, or
| me and my 9 associates here will punch you in the face,"
| you'd be committing a crime.
|
| That's the difference between being kicked off twitter
| and punching someone in the face. One of them is a crime.
| No matter how purely you uphold the principle of free
| speech, it doesn't make sense to compare someone who
| doesn't share those values to a criminal.
| evgen wrote:
| > A saying from a nation with collective psychological
| trauma of over 100 years. No thanks.
|
| Well, they do know what happens when you let Nazis and
| their apologists/enablers get a toehold in public
| discourse, so maybe they actually have something useful
| to contribute to the discussion.
| gooseus wrote:
| My impressions is that everyone whinging about privacy with
| regards to giving seditionists and terrorists a space to
| coordinate and share misinformation after the biggest attack
| on the US since 9/11 are just being contrarian or are
| absolutist to a fault in their libertarian ideals (which I
| mostly share).
|
| People minimizing this attack and not treating it like a
| legitimate 9/11 scale crisis for the US are not considering
| the propaganda win this is for extremist groups domestically
| and autocratic regimes internationally. Could this be a
| slippery slope? Sure, but it's not as slippery as the other
| side of the slope which goes right off a cliff.
|
| There is still plenty of time/space to have debates about how
| to move forward from here with moderation and privacy on
| social networks, but for now we are in the middle of an
| insurrection that needs to be put down.
|
| Also, should another attack take place couldn't platforms
| knowingly providing services to the capitol attackers find
| themselves liable for providing material support for
| terrorists? If I were managing risk at AWS that definitely be
| a major concern.
|
| My POV, if we wouldn't have a problem doing it to ISIS after
| an attack on our Capitol, then we shouldn't have problem
| doing the same to QAnon and these "patriots".
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| >People minimizing this attack and not treating it like a
| legitimate 9/11 scale crisis
|
| We're still getting groped by the TSA and wrapping up a war
| from the last time we had a 9/11 scale crisis. We were
| tricked into spending trillions of dollars and thousands of
| lives invading a nation that had nothing to do with it and
| we gave some of the less savory government agencies a lot
| of power which they still have not returned.
|
| I think the public is right to be hesitant to play the
| knee-jerk reaction game this time around considering how
| well it turned out last time.
| gooseus wrote:
| I think there is a big difference between invading two
| countries and passing the PATRIOT act and the reaction
| we're seeing here.
|
| All this "hold on and let's make sure we're not being too
| unfair to far-right extremists" while they actively
| recruit and plan more attacks sounds like an under-
| reaction from a fear of over-reacting.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > All this "hold on and let's make sure we're not being
| too unfair to far-right extremists" while they actively
| recruit and plan more attacks sounds like an under-
| reaction from a fear of over-reacting.
|
| I think it is right to be worried about the ascendant
| tech industry being able to quash certain ideas before
| they have a chance to influence voters at the ballot box.
|
| Just this past 3 months, we've seen _true_ stories about
| Joe Biden 's son banned from posting on social media,
| anti-Biden news outlets banned from posting, and now the
| president banned.
|
| I vote straight democrat pretty much every time, so that
| is where my leanings lie, but I'm not going to shut my
| eyes as wealth inequality goes over the moon in the past
| 20 years and consolidated platforms owned by the hyper-
| wealthy increasingly control what news people even see.
|
| To me, it is entirely inappropriate to be blase about
| this point.
| chmod600 wrote:
| Where you are going wrong is that none of what you say
| demands a hack or a data dump.
|
| Get warrants, subpoenas, etc., and go after those inciting
| riots/sedition.
| jaywalk wrote:
| > the biggest attack on the US since 9/11
|
| This is an absolutely disgusting and disgraceful thing to
| say.
| gooseus wrote:
| So you can name a bigger attack on the US that has
| happened in the last 20 years?
|
| Far fewer lives were lost, but the impact and
| implications of this are on par.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| They're just not even remotely the same thing.
|
| Nothing like 9/11 or the OKC bombing has happened in the
| last 19 years; full stop.
|
| I have lived in DC my whole life, I hate to see this
| happening in my city, but we can be honest with
| ourselves.
| macintux wrote:
| This could have led to the public execution of the Vice
| President and speaker of the house. This came close to
| being a dramatically worse event.
| seppin wrote:
| And until such a thing occurs, most Trump adjacent HN
| members with continue to play "no true scotsman" with the
| extremists amongst them.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| I am hardly Trump adjacent except, unfortunately,
| geographically.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > This could have led to the public execution of the Vice
| President and speaker of the house. This came close to
| being a dramatically worse event.
|
| I remain unconvinced about how close that actually was,
| nor have I seen a compelling case that it was _that_
| close actually made.
|
| Further, before it becomes close to "executing the Vice
| President", you can bet shots are going to actually be
| fired. Crowds of rioters behave _very differently_ when
| gunshots start ringing out.
| jaywalk wrote:
| A single, fatal shot was fired for precisely that reason.
| And even then, I don't think it was anywhere near
| "executing the VP" but more like getting too close to the
| area where the politicians were being kept safe.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > A single, fatal shot was fired for precisely that
| reason.
|
| The people most imminently in danger in that case, as I
| understand it, were staff in the Speakers Lobby, not
| members or the Vice President, who were in the chambers.
|
| But as I understand the timeline, the attack, with
| defenders just on the other side with guns drawn and
| prepared to fire, on the doors to at least one of the
| chambers _also_ were ongoing before members had been
| evacuated from the floor by another exit, so the incident
| at the Speakers Lobby came very close to being repeated
| where members were more immediately at risk.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > the attack, with defenders just on the other side with
| guns drawn and prepared to fire, on the doors to at least
| one of the chambers also were ongoing before members had
| been evacuated from the floor by another exit,
|
| Do you have a source for this? I understand you to be
| saying that the picture we all saw (of the guns being
| drawn at a door within one of the chambers) occurred
| while there were still elected representatives in that
| chamber?
| dragonwriter wrote:
| >Do you have a source for this?
|
| I'll try to dig up something; I've seen a couple accounts
| from people in the chamber or galleries that seemed to
| suggest that (I think specifically the House chamber).
| TomSwirly wrote:
| If the statement is false, it should be easy to come up
| with a counter-example...?
| jacquesm wrote:
| No, it is factually correct. They said 'since', not
| larger than. In the meantime, since 9/11 there have as
| far as I know it not been any larger attacks within the
| US on the United States itself. If you know of any then
| please correct me.
| [deleted]
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > on the United States itself.
|
| What does "on the United States itself" mean and why does
| 9/11 meet that standard but not, say, the Pulse nightclub
| shooting?
| jacquesm wrote:
| The Pulse nightclub is not typically associated with
| being a seat of government, though I don't doubt that
| people in government have been seated there.
|
| On 9/11 there was a plan set in motion to crash a plane
| in to the Capitol, which only failed because of the
| bravery of the passengers in that plane. Incidentally,
| the very same Capitol self described 'patriots' broke
| into and vandalized last week.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| > a legitimate 9/11 scale crisis
|
| So what made 9/11 have large _scale_ was the (thwarted)
| plot to crash into the Capitol and the successful attack
| on the Pentagon? Not the 2600 killed in the WTC?
|
| This seems like a very twisted reading to compare two
| not-actually-that-similar events.
| jacquesm wrote:
| I think you have a reading comprehension problem, but I
| don't think I'm capable of fixing it. Hint: it revolves
| around the word 'since'. Best of luck.
| whimsicalism wrote:
| The poster claimed this was a "9/11 scale crisis", I
| think it is not.
|
| Rather than engaging in the reasons for why it might be,
| you choose to insult my reading comprehension. Take care,
| and hopefully you can be more charitable to those you
| encounter in-person.
| jacquesm wrote:
| It _literally_ says "the biggest attack on the US since
| 9/11" in your quote. And it was. That's the part you had
| a problem with.
| [deleted]
| salawat wrote:
| Was about to ask the same thing. My, how the story changes when
| it's on the other foot. This type of thing is exactly why we
| can't have noce things. Regardless of how you feel about the
| people in question, the fact is you've got people on the side
| of throwing even more fuel 9n the fire for stoking divisiveness
| and chaos. The sheer fraction of HN posters who show no
| apparent awareness of this is a bit offputting.
| nullc wrote:
| Don't worry, the "hacked material" rule on twitter will prevent
| anything derived from this being posted on twitter.
|
| Right???
| yalogin wrote:
| Applying the rules uniformly means Twitter should wait 4 yrs
| and then ban them. I am sure you will agree to that.
| nullc wrote:
| You're referring to 2024 when twitter will ban the NY Times
| for posting materials derived from the orange clown's taxes
| and the NY Post for posting materials derived from the
| President-elect's son's laptop?
|
| Ah. Wait. They took one of these actions within an hour of
| it going up. :P I suppose it'll be no time at all until
| they take down the account of the person hacking Parler and
| live tweeting the content being discussed in this
| article... which they've been doing for that past ... 48
| hours.
| judge2020 wrote:
| Since it's WARC and is going to end up on archive.org
| (archive.org is going to host it, but a different org
| 'archive team' are the ones who downloaded it), twitter isn't
| going to stop it from being posted since it's just going to
| show up as a link to web.archive.org. Arguably this isn't
| 'hacked data' since it's stuff that was wget'd and no
| security measure circumvention took place.
| 1024core wrote:
| Why can't I download these files from archive.org? All of
| the interesting files are marked as "not available for
| download"
| judge2020 wrote:
| Maybe because it's still being imported, but the
| archive.org team probably needs to review it and make it
| more widely available (ie. on web.archive.org).
| nullc wrote:
| > no security measure circumvention took place
|
| You don't consider exploiting 2fa fail-open being triggered
| by deplatforming by their 2fa provider being used to mass
| password reset accounts and vacuum up their private
| messages not a security circumvention?
|
| What about using a arbitrary content type upload on their
| video subdomain to implement an XSS attack to allow them to
| download all videos, including ones sent privately between
| users?
| judge2020 wrote:
| https://github.com/ArchiveTeam/parler-
| grab/blob/master/parle...
|
| There might have been other attacks in the way you
| describe, but it doesn't seem to be used by the team
| behind archiving the content.
|
| https://archive.org/details/archiveteam_neparlepas
| sj3k wrote:
| You can pretty easily see for yourself they are THE bad guys.
| There are calls for violence and white supremacist rhetoric
| ever way you turn. You really have to try hard to find the non
| horrible parts of that site.
| kbelder wrote:
| You're slightly wrong by stressing "THE". They are SOME of
| the bad guys. Those weren't the only racially charged and
| violent riots that happened this year.
| driverdan wrote:
| Why is it awful? If something you say isn't end-to-end
| encrypted you should assume it could be made public. I wouldn't
| be upset if PMs from Twitter or FB were leaked either.
| electrondood wrote:
| I think most Americans have already judged for themselves.
|
| https://www.ipsos.com/en/american-reaction-pro-trump-mob-ass...
| devwastaken wrote:
| "the media". You're not being honest, you either havent used
| the platform or are deliberately lying here. Either way a
| platform that freeley allows the organization of violent mobs
| has no place, and neither does anybody who supports it.
| guscost wrote:
| So logically then, Twitter and all its users should be
| cancelled for freely allowing Antifa to organize there.
| tidepod12 wrote:
| Why do you use antifa as an example when there are much
| better examples like the Nation of Islam [1] and the
| Taliban [2] on Twitter?
|
| 1: https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-
| files/grou... ; https://twitter.com/OfficialNOI
|
| 2: https://twitter.com/Zabehulah_M33/status/134345826145921
| 8432
|
| Upgrade your argument!
| mountainb wrote:
| Yes, correct. The users are fine, just change the law to
| make things like Twitter impractical to run.
| devwastaken wrote:
| Which 'antifa'? If twitter allows people to organize
| aggressive violent behavior to violate others rights en
| mass - then sure ban twitter.
|
| I didn't say twitter or Facebook was better.
| bavent wrote:
| Ah yes, Antifa, known for throwing milkshakes, is
| equivalent to pipe bombs, trucks filled with guns and
| explosives, and people walking around with zip ties looking
| for pols to kidnap inside a government building they killed
| a cop to break into. Right. I forgot.
| vorpalhex wrote:
| Burning down a federal courthouse, burning down a police
| station, throwing molotov cocktails at federal police...
| boredumb wrote:
| Correct, You obviously forgot the last 8 months where
| multiple people were killed, federal and private
| buildings were lit on fire, politicians were assaulted
| and they setup multiple "autonomous" zones. Perhaps I
| missed the latest phase of word games where the word
| 'milkshakes' encapsulates this sort of behavior?
| guscost wrote:
| 25 people died in their riots last year.
| rightoven9 wrote:
| You're pretty quick to forget the Autonomous zone in
| Seattle where people died, or the continuous destruction
| in Portland over the last few months.
|
| Either Parler and Twitter are both dangerous or neither
| of them are.
| bostik wrote:
| There can be a difference in degree, it's not a binary
| option.
|
| Personally I think both are dangerous, but thanks to
| audience self-selection and rules of the platforms,
| Parler is more dangerous of the two.
| wassenaar10 wrote:
| > Either way a platform that freeley allows the organization
| of violent mobs has no place, and neither does anybody who
| supports it.
|
| So all social media then
| onion2k wrote:
| No, because most social media platforms don't _freely_
| allow the organization of violent mobs. Twitter, Facebook,
| etc will ban you for doing that. Even, as it turns out, if
| you 're the POTUS.
| albertgoeswoof wrote:
| back up a little here. I can find Parler on Google. Does that
| mean google should be shut down and everyone who supports it
| shut down as well?
|
| Twitter is used for this kind of thing too. So is whatsapp,
| signal, telegram etc.
|
| Do we ban all Trump marches/meetups just in case those are
| used as platforms to organize violence? Why don't we just ban
| meeting up in public for everyone who voted trump because
| people can use their mouths to arrange violent mobs too.
| devwastaken wrote:
| Google is not in control of the content on parler. Google
| does remove websites from it's listings.
|
| There's no relationship in what you're saying. Parler is
| responsible for content on it's platform. It doesn't matter
| if it's supposedly "neutral" or not.
|
| Parler is a social media app, not a messaging app like
| signal. People don't go to signal for their latest fake
| news, they would go to parler and be swayed by a mob of
| people that continually build off of each other's
| aggressive behavior. It was a closed loop of people that
| didn't like being told they're wrong.
|
| There's nothing neutral about parler either, their user
| base is no mistake. It's entirely intentional, you can't
| hide behind "freedom of speech" when you're marketing your
| platform for this behavior.
| papaf wrote:
| _Either way a platform that freeley allows the organization
| of violent mobs has no place, and neither does anybody who
| supports it._
|
| I feel the same way about Facebook [1]. This is not
| whataboutism. I truly believe Facebook should also be
| shutdown for its role in Genocide.
|
| [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/technology/myanmar-
| facebo...
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| I have a big issue with the importance of Facebook in this
| specific story (even if something similar will almost
| certainly happen or already have happened elsewhere) : I
| have been to Myanmar. The kind of people that they are
| talking about overwhelmingly are too poor to afford
| Internet/Facebook !
| papaf wrote:
| About 30% of the population:
| https://napoleoncat.com/stats/facebook-users-in-
| myanmar/2018...
|
| Its enough to raise a mob.
|
| Facebook are also central to the investigation:
| https://thediplomat.com/2020/08/how-facebook-is-
| complicit-in...
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Those 30% overwhelmingly live in the biggest cities. Not
| in the poor villages where the ethnic tensions started.
|
| (However, maybe Facebook indeed made things worse, once
| the Facebook-connected military got involved.)
| papaf wrote:
| Both internet and Facebook were available in rural areas.
| Described as an "internet revolution" at the time: https:
| //www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/01/the-f...
|
| The UN also said that Facebook played a "determining
| role" (see the Diplomat link).
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Hmm, I guess it's my damn fault for staying too much on
| the tourist route and assuming things from appearances !
|
| Charging phones from car batteries, damn !
| ahoy wrote:
| There are lots of those types of comments. Did you read?
| slothtrop wrote:
| I'm looking at one now.
| enkid wrote:
| I don't think it's fair to lump everyone into a pile like that.
| I agree with the decision of tech companies not to host Parler
| and disagree with leaking its contents. The comments section on
| any forum is made of a variety of people with a variety of
| views. You shouldn't be looking at a web forum for consistency.
| cactus2093 wrote:
| Why did you include that "the media told me" part? It
| dramatically weakens your argument. If you think you're right
| and are arguing in good faith, why add this throwaway strawman
| to imply that everybody who disagrees with you must be
| brainwashed by the media and not thinking for themselves?
| eudajmonia wrote:
| The find the whole narrative of dehumanising Trump supporters
| to be sick.
|
| The memory of all the pathological mob like violence that
| occurred during the BLM movement which occurred worldwide
| should still be fresh in all of our memories. If only the
| actors who incited that violence were held to this same
| standard.
| mrlala wrote:
| >The find the whole narrative of dehumanising Trump
| supporters to be sick.
|
| And I find you comparing BLM movement to Trump's supporters
| "election fraud" bullshit to be absolutely sickening.
| hannasanarion wrote:
| Quick question, how many BLM mobs beat two cops to death with
| flagpoles? How many built gallows and rushed into government
| buildings with handcuffs looking for politicians to execute?
| How many battered down the door to the room where the Vice
| President and Speaker of the House were hiding chanting "Hang
| Pence, Hang Pelosi"?
|
| And how many of them were inspired by prominent politicians
| telling them "We are never going to concede", "we are going
| to take our country back", "it's time for a trial by combat",
| "we are going together to the Capitol", "Mike Pence betrayed
| us", etc etc etc
| neartheplain wrote:
| I've recapped the depths of last summer's BLM/antifa
| violence in previous threads:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25667848
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25691407
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25671284
|
| Objectively, the summer's riots (as opposed to the more
| numerous peaceful protests) caused more deaths, injuries,
| and property damage. At the same time, the assault on the
| capitol was an unprecedented attack on democracy and the
| peaceful transition of power, to which there is no direct
| BLM parallel.
|
| For now, I suggest we all stop comparing these things. I
| don't think many are receptive to either side of the
| argument. Emotions are still running high, and we're not
| through the transition of power just yet.
| hannasanarion wrote:
| ooOOOOOoooo a video of a molotov cocktail, some people
| standing around and shouting, and a fake guillotine with
| a plastic blade, very scary.
|
| That's totally the same as invading the center of
| government decked out in illegal guns and armor while
| most of the line of succession is there, chanting your
| intention to murder them while breaking down doors,
| stealing government laptops, building a gallows to hang
| the politicians you don't like with, dragging police
| officers outside to beat them to death, all the while
| declaring the start of a new civil war, and while
| sympathetic insiders feed them real-time information
| about the location of the politicians you intend to kill,
| etc etc etc.
| generalk wrote:
| > I suggest we all stop comparing these things.
|
| Agreed, they are comparable only in superficial ways
| which remove context vital to the understanding of both
| events.
|
| One group of people were protesting/rioting because
| police continue to suffer little consequence for
| murdering Black folks, despite years of effort at reform.
|
| The other group protested/rioted by breaking into the
| Capitol and threatening to murder politicians because the
| current POTUS has claimed, repeatedly and without any
| evidence, that the election he recently lost was somehow
| rigged against him. Again, for context, this has come
| from the side of American politics that has for the past
| four years claimed that "elections have consequences."
|
| To compare these two events on a "look who did more
| violence" level is reductive at best and at worst a bad
| faith argument in support of the folks who stormed the
| capitol.
| neartheplain wrote:
| _One group of people were protesting /rioting because
| police continue to suffer little consequence for
| murdering Black folks, despite years of effort at
| reform._
|
| If "protesting/rioting" includes gunning down unarmed
| black kids in the street (third link above), count me
| out.
|
| This is a highly flammable topic and we seem unlikely to
| agree, so I'd prefer we pause here.
| hannasanarion wrote:
| A shooting happening in a protest area is not the same as
| armed protesters attacking the seat of the federal
| government chanting their intention to murder
| politicians.
| neartheplain wrote:
| Please don't use the passive voice [0] to intentionally
| obscure a crime's perpetrator.
|
| Antonio Mays Jr. was not killed near a protest by a
| random passerby. He was murdered by armed "anti-fascist"
| protestors. They shot him in the face with a rifle. It's
| on camera. The killers audibly confessed to the murder.
| See this link [1] for the clips, if you must. The footage
| is disturbing.
|
| [0] https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/george-
| floyd-pro...
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_K0tXOBPMHA&t=1m25s
| generalk wrote:
| > He was murdered by armed "anti-fascist" protestors.
|
| It appears that that link has not been confirmed, as of
| an August 2020 WaPo article[0], which points out that
| many of the deaths at the protests can not be
| conclusively linked to the demonstrators.
|
| [0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/08/26/al
| most-no...
| neartheplain wrote:
| Here is the scene right after the CHOP shooting, with
| several BLM/antifa protestors again confessing to their
| involvement. One says, "We drew down and gave him
| service." Another, "I ran out of bullets!" and then
| laughter. The reporter asks twice, "So the defense people
| shot this person?" and multiple protestors answer yes.
| They brag about "ex-military" security, and avoid saying
| whether the victims were armed (they were not). They
| repeat false rumors about an earlier drive-by, which
| turned out to be gunfire from other "defense people."
|
| If you can stomach it, watch the whole video. It is
| graphic:
|
| https://youtube.com/watch?v=0cUYLQkhGmU&t=2m
|
| Another clip with the killer(s) and other protestors
| repeating, "I didn't see sh*t!", the mantra of those who
| don't talk to police:
|
| https://youtube.com/watch?v=kDmNJ6tO2Lg
|
| Unsurprisingly, Seattle police have made no arrests in
| the case. Per official statement, the crime scene was
| destroyed and witnesses aren't cooperating.
|
| This happened in a residential neighborhood. An unarmed
| black kid died at the hands of political vigilantes.
| Rifle bullets entered people's homes. It barely made
| national news. Joe Biden felt no need to tweet. Compare
| that to later coverage of Kyle Rittenhouse. To some, this
| disparity represents a double standard.
|
| That double standard is the essence of my comparison
| between this summer's violence and the storming of the
| capitol. Both are reckless, deadly, and reprehensible.
| Both must be condemned. Perpetuating the double standard
| just perpetuates one group's grievance, fueling more
| violence.
| hannasanarion wrote:
| That doesn't change the fact that is was an isolated
| shooting that happened to happen in a protest area. That
| is not the same as mob formed and mobilized for the
| explicit and exclusive purpose of murder.
| generalk wrote:
| I'd challenge the assertion you're making here -- again,
| it is reductive to reduce the entirety of the nationwide
| protests against police murders to a handful of cherry-
| picked instances of violence. You're doing that and then
| dismissing the entire issue because of it, which is
| intellectually dishonest, which you already know.
|
| You _aren 't_ giving the same treatment to the the other
| side here -- you're not saying "if keeping people safe
| means the police should be allowed to murder folks /
| bludgeoning a police officer to death when storming the
| capitol" so I find it difficult to believe you're merely
| concerned about the use of violence.
|
| You did, several comments up, state "the assault on the
| capitol was an unprecedented attack on democracy," which
| it was, but that's after posting multiple links where
| you're posting links and evidence trying to discredit the
| nationwide BLM protests by painting them as violent, so
| again, your bias is evident.
| neartheplain wrote:
| _trying to discredit the nationwide BLM protests by
| painting them as violent_
|
| I'm only trying to discredit the violence, as I made
| clear in my original comment.
|
| If you'll casually assign me false motives and claim I'm
| "intellectually dishonest," I see no reason to continue
| our discussion.
| [deleted]
| spiderfarmer wrote:
| Trump's lawyer was asking the rioters to execute Mike Pence
| first.
|
| If I label him a terrorist, that doesn't mean I label all
| Trump followers terrorists.
|
| Stop thinking so black and white. It's that way of thinking
| that lead to all of this.
| davewritescode wrote:
| I do feel terrible for those people. Parler needs to be held
| civilly liable for what they've done.
|
| The real crime here is that Parler was collecting sensitive
| information above and beyond what most social providers were
| asking for and still made shoddy security decisions.
| LaMarseillaise wrote:
| You're right: Parler's negligence led to user data being taken.
| Parler should be punished for this.
| coldtea wrote:
| People the "good people" disagree with politically and
| culturally are equivalent to nazis, and it's ok for them to
| have anything bad happen to them
| redflame8 wrote:
| Do you not understand that this logic leads to bigotry and
| genocide as people vie to out virtue signal one another out
| of fead
| cactus2093 wrote:
| Ermm, people who are trying to violently and undemocratically
| install an authoritarian government while using slogans like
| "6 million was not enough" are literally nazis.
|
| You're gonna have to find another hyperbolically bad thing to
| accuse your opponents of fear mongering about.
| coldtea wrote:
| > _hyperbolically bad thing_
|
| You mean like that these group was "violently and
| undemocratically install an authoritarian government"? Did
| you feel much scared of the possibility of some
| dictatorship (as opposed to an act of protest in the
| congress)?
|
| Second, even if they did seriously try to do that, heck,
| even if they succeeded in establishing an "authoritarian
| government", that wouldn't be enough to qualify them as
| "literally nazis".
|
| We don't call all authoritarian government nazis. Just the
| ones that actually are nazist.
|
| In fact, the most succesful ones we call "business as
| usual", with the Patriot Act, surveillance, several global
| wars, torture, etc...
| FireBeyond wrote:
| > that wouldn't be enough to qualify them as "literally
| nazis"
|
| How about SS tattoos?
|
| "6MWE" - "6 Million Wasn't Enough"
|
| "1488"
|
| "Camp Auschwitz"
|
| All things seen in the group.
|
| But I get it, still not nazis, neonazi, or other. I guess
| unless they were card-carrying, dues-paying members of
| Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei?
| IfOnlyYouKnew wrote:
| Do you, like, not get the "6 million..." reference?
|
| They also had functioning gallows, and a guy with a taser
| and zip ties running around in the Senate chamber just
| minutes after it was evacuated, and lots of "kill Mike
| Pence" shouting.
|
| Some people were there to take selfies. Others were there
| to take hostages.
| cactus2093 wrote:
| > that wouldn't be enough to qualify them as "literally
| nazis"
|
| Yes but the whole wishing to extend the holocaust and
| kill more jews thing makes them nazis
|
| > Did you feel much scared of the possibility of some
| dictatorship
|
| Why are you pretending this about some abstract threat of
| some vague unspecified dictatorship? If Trump had
| succeeded in his attempts at gaining a second term, when
| he lost by a landslide in the democratic and fair
| election, that would make him a dictator. And it was
| their goal to try to make that happen.
|
| Peacefully assembling outside the capital with signs
| would be a protest. Breaking into the capital armed with
| guns and pipe bombs and zipties looking to take members
| of congress hostage, killing police that stood in the
| way, bringing a working gallows and chanting to hang the
| VP who presides over the senate, during the vote in which
| they are certifying the election, is an insurrection
| attempt.
| andrewclunn wrote:
| Account created 12 days ago... Will they make it a full 14
| before they get shadow banned? A new user who doesn't
| understand what "hacker news" is really about, or somebody who
| knows exactly what it is and made an alt account to post stuff
| like this while protecting their main one? Ah the joys of
| modern censorship.
| beshrkayali wrote:
| The ramifications of this will absolutely set a record for the
| future as the inevitable reverse will happen.
|
| People are forgetting that if they're ok with this sort of
| behavior now, it'll be difficult for them to argue-against or
| prevent the same behavior when their opposites are in control.
| yanderekko wrote:
| >People are forgetting that if they're ok with this sort of
| behavior now, it'll be difficult for them to argue-against or
| prevent the same behavior when their opposites are in
| control.
|
| I'd argue the opposite: As the rank rhetorical hypocrisy on
| BLM-related protests vs. Trump protests shows, the
| marketplace of ideas has broken down and all that really
| matters is power. We're only a couple steps away from
| tech/media being able to dictate that we've always been at
| war with Eastasia, with a horde of willing partisans being
| eager to punish any sort of dissent on the matter. Being
| hypocritical is unimportant if you have the ability to mess
| with the lives of those who are too vocal in pointing out
| whatever hypocrisy. Most people are perfectly rational in not
| being willing to risk cancellation by speaking up.
| guscost wrote:
| They are betting everything on the belief that they will win
| permanently this time, and their opponents will never get
| control again.
| [deleted]
| valvar wrote:
| It reminds me of Pascal's wager. How confident can one be
| that one's chosen political team will definitely win out in
| the long run? 90%? That seems very high, but even if you're
| 99% sure, are you willing to act in a way that will surely
| warrant retribution in the unlikely adverse scenario? Seems
| like a pretty dumb wager to make.
| scythe wrote:
| >The ramifications of this will absolutely set a record for
| the future as the inevitable reverse will happen.
|
| Will happen? Try _has happened_. Partisan hacking has been a
| thing for a decade. Remember the DNC emails? Remember weev?
|
| >People are forgetting that if they're ok with this sort of
| behavior now
|
| What does it matter if I'm okay with it? Nobody consulted
| _me_ before breaking into Parler. In fact, they didn 't take
| my opinion into account at all. Sure, grey-hats are somewhat
| motivated by public opinion, but even _Mitch McConnell_ gave
| a floor speech on Wednesday angry enough to incite a few
| keyboard taps.
|
| >it'll be difficult for them to argue-against or prevent the
| same behavior
|
| Because American politics consistently punishes hypocrisy,
| right?
| boredumb wrote:
| Under the assumption people are remotely ingenuous I'd agree,
| but in recent years I think that ship has sailed. The means
| always justify the ends, and ideological consistency is
| apparently chalked up to a loser's game.
| arbitrage wrote:
| The ramifications for pursuing and persecuting traitors to
| the United States of American are going to be what, exactly?
|
| Please tell me how rooting out seditionists is a bad thing.
| ceilingcorner wrote:
| I think it's actually a part of the plan. When the opposite
| party gains power in 4 years and does the same thing, you get
| to call them tyrants then, too. Clearly no one cares about
| being hypocritical anymore. All that matters is winning the
| media outrage battle of the moment.
| throwaway316943 wrote:
| Unfortunately it won't be the same. The precedent will have
| been set and they'll be able to ratchet it up to a new
| level. It's going to be bad and I'm disgusted by how many
| people in here are cheering it on when it's their side
| doing the kicking. Doxing, canceling, Twitter hate mobs,
| riot-protests, attacks on journalists, politically
| motivated violence. All becoming standard practice. Nobody
| cares as long as it's their team scoring a goal. You'd have
| to be blind not to see where this is leading.
| ceilingcorner wrote:
| I am very, very concerned where it is heading. Trump is a
| temporary disaster that will be gone soon. Dangerous new
| precedents won't be.
| adrr wrote:
| Ramification is Parler is going to be first company to see
| how effective CCPA is in punishing companies that have
| inadequate security.
| IfOnlyYouKnew wrote:
| Feel free to doxx all the antifa message boards where we one-
| up each other with fun new ways to execute our foes.
| xiphias2 wrote:
| Where is the responsible security disclosure?
|
| If these guys are security researchers, then Julian Assange is
| the best security researcher of the world.
|
| This all looks like normal politics to me.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| This person committed a crime to leak this data. I don't know how
| any of you can be this blatantly two-faced or so unprincipled.
|
| You're cheering on a criminal committing a crime. You're cheering
| on the suppression of an entire political party, while calling
| them extremists, fascists, terrorists, and every other -ist that
| you feel vaguely fits the bill.
|
| Yes, a few of them marched on the capitol. Yes, that was awful.
| No, you're not going to stop the underlying feeling by simply
| wishing it away, or taking more and more byzantine measures to
| suppress their ability to associate with one another.
| Finnucane wrote:
| It is certainly arguable that if this data contained evidence
| of serious crimes--such as plotting treason and murder of
| government officials--then under normal circumstances, it
| should be turned over to the appropriate agencies, such as the
| FBI, and not released publicly, so as to not doxx people who
| may not necessarily have committed any crime beyond the poor
| judgement of hanging with fascists.
|
| Whether we can beleive that the FBI, etc, will deal with this
| appropriately is another matter.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| That's a fine argument, and if someone had seen such a thing,
| it might even change my mind. But this was done preemptively:
| "that _probably_ exists, so this is _probably_ okay."
| Finnucane wrote:
| Some of it _had_ been seen. The folks plotting criminal
| stuff weren 't especially good at keeping it hidden.
| diragon wrote:
| Not an entire political party. "All terrorists all Republicans"
| (which is most probably a true statement for the terrorists who
| attacked the Capitol) and "All Republicans are terrorists" are
| not equivalent statements.
|
| Republicans are way more than that alt-right fringe. They have
| a respectable history and many good political stances.
| dominotw wrote:
| DNC emails were leaked by russian "security researchers".
| akhilcacharya wrote:
| DNC emails weren't planning terrorist attacks.
| 1MachineElf wrote:
| Just because Russians broke in doesn't mean it was them. I
| still believe it was an inside job.
| dominotw wrote:
| Yes, it could've been internal security researchers.
| [deleted]
| stevespang wrote:
| Security Researchers is a BS coverup title for criminal hackers -
| - - FBI should prosecute.
| calibas wrote:
| Can we kill the whole "security researcher" term right now?
| Hacker is so much easier to type.
| [deleted]
| coast12 wrote:
| You say leaked, I say additional backup :)
| magicalhippo wrote:
| I'm really starting to feel like my grandparents, who smiled back
| at me in such a way I could tell they had no idea what I was
| talking about back when I was a kid.
|
| This hack made the "front page" of news sites here in Norway, and
| I've never heard of the thing.
|
| I guess it's only fitting that I just got my own lawn...
| mcast wrote:
| I tried to sign up for Parler out of curiosity when I heard it
| was being removed from app stores, but as soon as it required a
| phone number for account registration I deleted the app.
|
| I'm surprised it also didn't require a social security number and
| credit card as well. /s
| [deleted]
| ausbah wrote:
| some parts of the site apparently require a SSN and drivers
| lisence
| [deleted]
| zyxzevn wrote:
| So, can we now all see the contents of Hunter Biden's laptop as
| well?
| chmod600 wrote:
| When Edward Snowden leaked information, he went through a
| journalist gatekeeper to do so as responsibly as possible.
|
| Even the Hunter Biden story went through the NY Post.
|
| This doesn't feel like a responsible, good-faith effort to save
| the republic. It feels like an attack on one's political enemies.
|
| Using the euphemnism "security researcher" in this case doesn't
| help. Perhaps underhanded tactics are needed to prevent evidence
| destruction, but call them what they are. Don't pretend they are
| curious academics or a corporation hardening their systems.
| exabrial wrote:
| I disagree with everything Parler, but this is a pretty steep
| ethical violation.
| [deleted]
| sphuff wrote:
| Discussion of how it was done here:
| https://www.reddit.com/r/ParlerWatch/comments/kuqvs3/all_par...
|
| Edit: this Reddit post appears to be inaccurate. More details
| here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25725268
| whymauri wrote:
| This copypasta is incorrect. See more here:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25725268
| sphuff wrote:
| Ah, thanks for the info. I'll edit my post.
| mxcrossb wrote:
| The linked post celebrates this saying they can share this data
| with law enforcement, but is it legal for them to pursue cases
| based on the evidence found in stolen data?
| Triv888 wrote:
| I don't know but they have "legal" work-arounds:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction
| moksly wrote:
| Yes.
| psychometry wrote:
| Why doesn't chain of custody apply to data?
| moksly wrote:
| It does, but it's actually the fourth amendment that
| would be in place here, and numerous child pornography
| cases as well as the Panama papers have shown that US
| courts will allow illegally obtained data, as long as it
| was obtained by private citizens who were not working
| with law enforcement and that the data can be established
| as reasonably untampered.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| It does, but in a murder trial, the weapon was generally
| out of police custody for at least some time, right?
|
| There's an opportunity to introduce reasonable doubt when
| a third-party is in possession of the data in-between,
| but it's likely this sort of data isn't going to be the
| _only_ evidence in any resulting prosecutions. It 's far
| more likely to be probable cause for warrants.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/searches-private-
| cit...
|
| > But, in some ways, there's really no such thing as an
| "illegal" search by a private citizen, at least in the sense
| that police searches can be illegal: Regardless of issues
| like lack of probable cause, evidence found by private
| citizens acting on their own is usually admissible in court.
| That's true even if the private citizen committed a crime
| like trespass or theft to accomplish the search.
| mxcrossb wrote:
| Thank you very much for the detailed link
| swalsh wrote:
| Could these "Researchers" be prosecuted under CFAA? Purposely
| accessing information known to be private?
|
| EDIT: accidently wrote DMCA
| Miner49er wrote:
| Yes, of course. This is an illegal hack.
|
| Edit: I should add, it would be under the CFAA.
|
| Edit #2: I could be wrong, it looks like they used Parler's
| APIs, and didn't bypass any auth. I really shouldn't have even
| called this a hack, it's more just archiving. But weev went to
| jail for the same thing, so I'd say there's a chance of
| prosecution, would come down to a court case. If I was the
| person who did this, I would never step foot in America, just
| to be safe.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| Is it? The article indicates at least some of this comes from
| merely incrementing an integer in the video URLs.
|
| > I am now crawling URLs of all videos uploaded to Parler.
| Sequentially from latest to oldest. VIDXXX.txt files coming
| up, 50k chunks, there will be 1.1M URLs total...
| rvz wrote:
| Well if I were to do the same to any social network, I
| would have to request their permission first on the basis
| of security research according to their Terms of Service.
|
| In this case it is still an unauthorised hack.
| dragontamer wrote:
| I believe from a legal standpoint, all that matters is
| whether the user intended it to be private or not.
|
| It is a felony to open a mail envelope addressed to someone
| else. It doesn't matter that a butterknife can cut open the
| envelope, the intent is clear.
| andromeduck wrote:
| This is more a postcard than a letter.
| dragontamer wrote:
| The public posts are probably allowed to be accessed
| (like a postcard).
|
| The issue comes with the posts that were deleted: they
| arguably have an expectation of privacy.
|
| EDIT: And direct messages, if they work like Twitter,
| DEFINITELY have an expectation of privacy. If Parler has
| a DM-like system, they are probably illegal to access.
| lmkg wrote:
| At least one person has already been prosecuted for
| "hacking" for incrementing integers in a URL.
| [deleted]
| bgentry wrote:
| People have been sent to prison before for nothing more
| than fetching publicly available web pages by incrementing
| numbers in a URL:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weev
| ceejayoz wrote:
| We tend to think that's bad and an incorrect definition
| of cracking that should be overturned around here, right?
|
| > the conviction was vacated by a higher court
|
| > While the judges did not address the substantive
| question on the legality of the site access, they were
| skeptical of the original conviction, noting that no
| circumvention of passwords had occurred and that only
| publicly accessible information was obtained.
| [deleted]
| Eupolemos wrote:
| I don't know how it works "over there", but where I'm
| from "URL-hacking" is not considered hacking, but data
| publicly available.
| rob74 wrote:
| ...and you are 100% sure that if this got before a court,
| the decision would go your way?
| ViViDboarder wrote:
| I'm assuming, but the USA then. What country is that?
| RIMR wrote:
| It was a bit more than that. The attack was against AT&T,
| there was zero public interest in the information from a
| whistleblower perspective, the victims were customers of
| AT&T, a telecommunications provider.
|
| Dumping the contents of a far-right website that helped
| push for Insurrection against the US Government seems
| pretty tame by comparison.
|
| Also, Weev is open and proudly a Nazi, so the optics of
| bringing him up while defending the rights of a Fascist
| website isn't great.
| bgentry wrote:
| >The attack was against AT&T, there was zero public
| interest in the information from a whistleblower
| perspective, the victims were customers of AT&T, a
| telecommunications provider.
|
| You think there's "zero public interest" in knowing that
| a large US corporation, with private information about a
| significant fraction of the American public, has
| neglected their obligations to protect that private
| information? And that they've ignored all pleas to treat
| the vulnerability with the seriousness it deserves?
|
| >Also, Weev is open and proudly a Nazi, so the optics of
| bringing him up while defending the rights of a Fascist
| website isn't great.
|
| How are his political leanings relevant to the question
| of whether accessing this data would constitute a crime?
| rob74 wrote:
| ...and publishing the personal data they got their hands
| on this way ("In revealing the flaw to the media, the
| group also exposed personal data from over 100,000
| people")
| Miner49er wrote:
| Weev when to jail for the exact same thing under the CFAA.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| Weev's conviction was vacated.
| Miner49er wrote:
| On a technicality because of where he was charged, not
| because of the law. I don't think he should have ever
| been convicted under the CFAA, but he was.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| From Wiki on his case:
|
| > While the judges did not address the substantive
| question on the legality of the site access, they were
| skeptical of the original conviction, noting that no
| circumvention of passwords had occurred and that only
| publicly accessible information was obtained.
|
| It's a pity it didn't make it to full review on appeal to
| get a solid ruling on this.
| [deleted]
| diebeforei485 wrote:
| Possibly. Automatically creating fake user accounts[1] likely
| falls into that category.
|
| I'm not in favor of vigilante justice. I hope some of these
| people do sued under the CFAA. If all they wanted to do was
| archive public posts, there are ways to do that that don't
| involve programmatically creating fake accounts.
|
| [1] https://archive.is/Dupjk
| lmkg wrote:
| DMCA is only for intellectual property, not private information
| in general.
|
| There are other laws this would likely fall under. Laws against
| hacking are generally "access in excess of authorization,"
| where "authorization" is _legal_ permission, not system
| permission.
| swalsh wrote:
| I think I meant to write CFAA, thanks for pointing that out.
| Comment updated.
| GaryNumanVevo wrote:
| Doubtful, all the links were publicly accessible. I believe the
| researcher just crawled the "video.parler.com" domain after
| finding out they used sequential IDs.
|
| Allegedly Parler didn't scrub exif data from any media,
| including all of their "verification" materials including
| Drivers Licenses and Passports.
| base698 wrote:
| Practically no. Judges, tech community lobbyists, and basically
| the entire state is on their side.
| neartheplain wrote:
| That's not really how it works, jury nullification
| notwithstanding.
| nrmitchi wrote:
| Trigger warning, but this reminds me of the Steubenville High
| school rape case (you can google it).
|
| A hacker accessed and leaked video of the situation in
| question (IIRC after officials refused to take action, and
| gone as far as too allegedly cover up the incident in order
| to protect the athletes and school's program).
|
| At least one of the individuals responsible for leaking the
| video was charged under CFAA. IIRC this individual received a
| harsher sentence than those involved in the underlying crime.
|
| You'd like to think that a judge and entire state would be
| understanding, but that's not always the case and not
| something to depend on.
| Anon1096 wrote:
| I think the extracting of the data will definitely go to court
| as a violation of the CFAA. The publishing of the data might
| also fall under the DMCA but it sounds less plausible to me.
| I'm not a lawyer so take this with a grain of salt.
| AnHonestComment wrote:
| Publishing the data could be DMCA'd by the authors of the
| original messages.
| boringg wrote:
| Would not want to be a part of the Parler team before this, and
| certainly not after this week. I can only imagine they are
| dealing with an insane amount of fires, rapid growth/demand and
| it seems that they have a far from robust product. Compound all
| that with the political component and intense attention - it
| would be an unbearable grind.
| chopin24 wrote:
| Can we now see how many users there actually were, and how many
| were in the US? Because there's no shortage of troll farm
| companies that exist solely to get people riled up.
| nr2x wrote:
| One side has the guns, the other the hackers. Place your bets.
| krisdol wrote:
| Shooting the computer does not erase uploaded evidence of
| criminal activity.
| WJW wrote:
| Pretty sure the side with the hackers also has guns though?
| jefe_ wrote:
| It's interesting to me that the demand for Parler was almost
| exclusively the result of policies enacted by other social media
| platforms. Perhaps there was merit to the notion that letting
| groups operate in a contained area of larger platforms would have
| been favorable to outright bans. This would allow the larger
| platforms to monitor engagement, control spread, and quietly
| respond as they desired, no one the wiser. Instead they made very
| public proclamations of content restrictions and bans, which
| escalated some casual participants to more engaged participants.
| These participants then gathered on a new platform that promised
| the ability to say anything, so they started saying anything. But
| then some people started to believe anything. And then the
| beliefs turned into action, and then it became a real problem.
| But the outcome is in no way surprising. What is surprising is
| that the response now is the same response that started it all,
| more public bans and content restrictions. It's trivial to start
| a social media app (especially when security is not the
| priority), so in a few months another app will pop up, and it too
| will get out of hand, but what then? It seems like policymakers
| and thought leaders aren't thinking long term and are doing
| nothing to look at underlying issues.
| cactus2093 wrote:
| Sounds like you're arguing for more of an approach of placating
| them, giving them a platform and trying to listen to them as
| misunderstood victims.
|
| Seems to me like that's exactly what the rest of the country
| has been doing this whole time. For years everyone went along
| with the fringe right and placated them. The mainstream media
| covered Trump closely. Talked to his supporters to try to
| understand them. The more mainstream Republicans have backed up
| all the things Trump has done and said until now. Facebook got
| tons of flack the last 4 years for not silencing them sooner.
| Now it has escalated to dangerous levels of inciting violence
| that actually came pass, which has led to a stronger response.
| But you're arguing for continuing to go along with them? Why
| should we expect that continuing down the path we've been on
| for years would reverse the trend of them getting more and more
| extreme?
| WillPostForFood wrote:
| "Security researchers"?!
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Photo caption says :
|
| "Trump storming the US Capitol on January 6, 2021"
|
| While as we know very well, chicken shit (and/or delusional?) as
| he is, Trump _himself_ did no such thing.
| KuhlMensch wrote:
| I don't know this news site, but I hope its a typo
| shadowgovt wrote:
| It feels like this sort of fail-open should never have passed a
| security audit.
|
| ... but that's probably one of the lessons here: unless we demand
| accountability, we generally have no idea of what practices
| services we rely upon are using. How many systems we use daily do
| _any_ kind of formal audits?
| tekstar wrote:
| All the claims about the big tech censoring Parler got it wrong.
| It's not about censure. It's about legality, and Parler fucked
| themselves.
|
| Apple told Parler to moderate their extremist content, and Parler
| refused. At that point, if Apple left Parler on the App Store,
| Apple would be complicit. Same story played out for all the
| services.
|
| And guess what, treason by definition is infectious. Giving aid
| to an enemy of the United States. So Apple at that point would be
| opening themselves to a huge legal liability if they kept the app
| available. Nothing has been proven in court but big tech is
| naturally risk adverse.
|
| If Parler has agreed to moderate extreme content, even if they
| had done so dragging their feet, they would still be alive.
| quotemstr wrote:
| Refusal to impose extralegal speech restrictions is treason?
| No, it doesn't work like that. See the Brandenburg case. You
| have no idea what you're talking about.
| tekstar wrote:
| Illegal. Some of the content on Parler was illegal. Not
| extralegal. Illegal. And they refused to moderate it when
| asked.
|
| Some if it has the risk of ending up judged treasonous as
| well, and that's all that matters to a risk averse company.
| quotemstr wrote:
| The claim I see over and over is that broad swaths of
| speech on Parler were illegal. It's not true. Repeating it
| doesn't make it so. "Insurrection" --- a call to overthrow
| the government --- is 100% legal speech in the US under the
| Brandenburg precedent. You don't get to call a company's
| refusal to go beyond the law in enforcing speech a form of
| treason.
| Traster wrote:
| I decided to look it up
|
| >The Court held that the government cannot punish
| inflammatory speech unless that speech is "directed to
| inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is
| likely to incite or produce such action"
|
| I would say it's pretty clear that the speech we're
| talking about incited or produced imminent lawlessness.
| If you were following the various platforms that these
| groups were organising on it was very clear that they
| were inciting lawless action on the 6th- which of course
| was demonstrated on the 6th. It's also important to
| understand this didn't stop on the 6th, those same people
| are now talking about the 20th with similar suggestions.
|
| Brandenburg seems to protect basically idle talk - but
| that's very clearly not what's happening here.
| tekstar wrote:
| I never said there had to be swaths of illegal content.
|
| In other words you are asserting there was absolutely no
| illegal content on parler that would require them to
| moderate their content when asked. If that's the stand
| you want to take, cool, have a great day, I am not
| responding to you further. Corporate legal risk
| assessment is what killed Parler.
| ALittleLight wrote:
| So long as we're talking about white supremacists and hacking, I
| remember when a "white supremacist" hacker weev was convicted and
| sentenced to 41 months in federal prison for reading a few
| thousand sequential ids from an AT&T webpage. He reported the
| vulnerability to AT&T and showed a limited example to a
| journalist.
|
| This seems far worse - so of course we can expect criminal
| prosecution of these "researchers"?
| uses wrote:
| Why'd you put "white supremacist" in quotes? He's a proud neo
| nazi.
| ALittleLight wrote:
| Because I don't know much else about him apart from that
| story and I don't trust the media when they call people white
| supremacists. I intend the quotes to indicate that people
| call him a white supremacist, not that I don't.
| arthurcolle wrote:
| Sorry for the double post but hoping someone could chime in -
|
| How did they accumulate so much content so fast? 70TB seems
| insanely huge for a pretty new company, isn't it only like 5
| months old?
| thomastjeffery wrote:
| When you purposefully leak private data, you no longer get to
| hide behind the title "Security Researcher".
| Benjmhart wrote:
| The vast majority of this data was posted publicly. You have no
| reasonable expectation of privacy.
| jtbayly wrote:
| Vast majority? OK..... So what about the stuff that was from
| private posts? You're really going to justify this?
| AnHonestComment wrote:
| You have a copyright protection against other people posting
| your messages for their benefit.
|
| Anyone who wanted to claim their posts could DMCA them.
| tedjdziuba wrote:
| Mostly peaceful security researcher?
| newacct583 wrote:
| Parler was ground zero for the community that announced and
| executed the attack on the capitol. Thought leaders there were
| routinely evoking, imagining, and outright calling for
| violence, and the crowd was a feedback loop. Fundamentally the
| Parler community existed to provide a platform for people who
| had been already banned from Twitter. Frankly the peaceful use
| of the site was mostly incidental.
|
| I think there's a real argument that this data is in the public
| interest.
| ErikVandeWater wrote:
| Do you have evidence that more violent activity was planned
| on Parler than Facebook or Twitter, or even a
| disproportionate amount?
|
| Edit: I suppose not.
| newacct583 wrote:
| Lin Wood called for Pence to be executed. This got shared a
| ton (like tens of thousands of times). A few days later
| there was a mob in the capitol chanting "Hang Mike Pence!".
|
| Lin Wood didn't say that on Twitter, because he had been
| previously banned on Twitter for similar rhetoric. Not sure
| about his status on Facebook, but Parler was absolutely
| where this stuff was happening.
|
| The denial here is just wild. Like... this is all over the
| news.
|
| Edit: some collated examples that just went by on my
| twitter feed, including the Wood threat:
| https://twitter.com/drewharwell/status/1348463074295107585
| swalsh wrote:
| I generally agree that information from here related to the
| attack is in the public interest. But this is going to also
| reveal people who had no part of it. I don't think it's fair
| to justify revealing innocent peoples data.
| cactus2093 wrote:
| I guess that depends if you see Parker as a general purpose
| social media site, which seems like a stretch. It's a site
| dedicated to one cause, Trumpism, which is now a movement
| that is responsible for terrorism and an insurrection
| attempt on the US.
|
| Did the people cheering at hitler's rallies but who never
| actually murdered anybody themselves have "no part in" the
| Holocaust?
| TomSwirly wrote:
| Why are we always asked to care about awful people who
| would happily see us all dead?
| [deleted]
| newacct583 wrote:
| How many "innocent" people were actually on Parler? It was
| a brand new service. It really was "Twitter for
| conservatives who got banned from Twitter". Almost
| literally everyone there was one of:
|
| 1. Someone who got banned from Twitter 2. Someone who wants
| to follow someone who got banned from Twitter 3. Someone
| (e.g. journalists) who want to follow all those people
|
| At what point does an online community become a danger to
| everyone? I'll note we had similar questions about much
| simpler services back in the days after 9/11, and the
| consensus opinion was very different then.
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| This is because the situation is _also_ very different
| from 9 /11 ?
| redflame8 wrote:
| You sound like the kid that couldnt understand why no one
| hungout with them
| throwaway3699 wrote:
| You can't be serious. There were literally millions of
| users on the platform.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| https://www.news10.com/news/us-capitol-coverage/poll-one-
| fif...
|
| > Poll: One-fifth of voters, almost half of Republicans,
| agree with storming of US Capitol
| themaninthedark wrote:
| Data is from:
| https://today.yougov.com/topics/politics/articles-
| reports/20...
|
| The question asked was: "Supporters of President Trump
| have stormed the US Capitol to protest lawmakers
| certifying Joe Biden's election victory. Based on what
| you have read or heard about this, do you support or
| oppose these actions? (%)"
|
| Breakdown groups were: Strongly or somewhat support,
| Don't know, N/A - Unaware of the story, Strongly or
| somewhat oppose
|
| I would be interested in seeing the strongly and somewhat
| support breakdowns. I have no problem with groups
| protesting elections, I think that the Trump supporters
| who stormed the Capitol building did the worst thing for
| their cause.
| TomSwirly wrote:
| Literally tens of millions of people strongly supported
| the attack on the Capitol. And instead of realizing that
| this is a bad idea, they are doubling down.
| newacct583 wrote:
| Per Wikipedia, the count of active users was 4M. And
| that's about right for the community of active "MAGA
| head" republicans in question.
|
| A lot of the horror and cognitive dissonance of this
| moment is that the mob the President aimed at Congress on
| Wednesday was not a weird or fringe group. They were just
| his fans. Look at the crowd, along with the armored
| people smashing windows and beating cops were smiling
| grandparents with flags. It's all the same group.
|
| The overlap between "mainstream republican" and "right
| wing terrorist" in our society has become horrifyingly
| blurred. So a lot of sincere attempts to address
| extremism look like "censoring republicans".
| yanderekko wrote:
| And a lot of insincere attempts to address extremism look
| like "censoring Republicans".
| TomSwirly wrote:
| Republicans have a perfectly good voice on conventional
| social media.
|
| No one's censoring people on social media for quoting
| William F. Buckley, but for actively planning and
| encouraging a violent insurrection.
| yanderekko wrote:
| Most people being banned did not do that, including Trump
| himself, and in fact the rapidly-expanding domain of
| speech that is being pretextually construed of as
| "actively planning and encouraging a violent
| insurrection" is in fact a large part of the problem
| here.
| esc_colon_q wrote:
| Literally declaring yourself the winner of an election
| that you solidly lost and then repeating that claim over
| and over again as your supporters rile themselves up and
| prepare for violence abso-fucking-lutely qualifies. If
| the election really was stolen (it wasn't), then violence
| on a grand scale would be more than justified (it's not),
| so pushing a false claim to that effect when you have as
| much power to make it stick is one of the most directly
| violent acts that can be committed.
|
| "This election was stolen" is way more dangerous than
| "Fire!" in a crowded theater because if the bullshit
| sticks then you actually end up with war.
| _jal wrote:
| I don't know which particular attempts you're referring
| to, actual referents would assist in understanding your
| point.
|
| But let's be clear: Republicans violently sacked Congress
| and and attempted to overthrow our government. It wasn't
| all Republicans, or even most.
|
| But the bulk of Republicans who didn't do this should be
| standing up and vocally disowning those who did, before
| their entire party is perverted.
|
| If you don't, I and a lot of other people will assume you
| support the Cruz, Hawley & Trump insurrection, with
| reason.
| djtriptych wrote:
| The rules are different when the democracy is at stake, as
| this country's history should have taught you.
| [deleted]
| mickmars wrote:
| The Roman Republic had that exact behavior of different
| rules in times of crisis. That landed them with Julius
| Caesar who refused to return his power, and that did not
| end well for republic.
| salawat wrote:
| Yeahhh... No.
|
| A good half the problems in the world are created when we
| try to force oversized round pegs through undersized
| square holes. Besides which, was Parler not the site that
| required excessive amounts of personal info just to sign
| up?
|
| That means if authentication failed open, that could mean
| that this researcher has obtained access to reams of PII.
| Which they'll deny or state that of courae they didn't
| collect or look at, but the potential breach is large
| enough that doing something like this is so
| unconscionably reckless and stupid, it ranks right up
| there with the event that even has this site in the
| public eye in the first place.
|
| Another brick through the stained glass windows of
| American civil discourse. We don't even need other
| country's help to push us to the brink because of
| reckless moves like this.
| [deleted]
| djtriptych wrote:
| Yeah, yes. Look at literally any time the democracy was
| seriously threatened and what happened to domestic
| liberty during that time.
| swalsh wrote:
| Was it okay to place Japanese in internment camps? Not
| going to wait for an answer, because the answer should
| clearly be no. Curtailing domestic liberties is not okay
| regardless the circumstances.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| thaufeki wrote:
| The personal data of everyone who has used the site is in the
| public interest? Are you high?
| jacksonkmarley wrote:
| Well, there's this from Glenn Greenwald:
|
| > Do you know how many of the people arrested in connection
| with the Capitol invasion were active users of Parler?
|
| > Zero.
|
| > The planning was largely done on Facebook.
|
| [0] https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1348619731734028293
| ?s=...
|
| edit: bad formatting
| sangnoir wrote:
| Where did he get his data from to assert that with
| confidence? Also, how many people had been arrested _in
| total_ at the time of Glenn 's tweet - I have a feeling the
| number is going to go _way_ up, and with Parler data
| becoming public, it will be easy to disprove his assertion
| (which may be technically true, but has low information
| density)
| dragonwriter wrote:
| Well, there's this by me:
|
| > Do you know how many of the people arrested in connection
| with the Capitol invasion were active users of Parler?
|
| No, and neither does Greenwald, because its not like Parler
| has a real-name-to-account lookup function he has access
| to, or authorities have compiled and released breakdowns of
| all the social media accounts of arrestees, etc.
|
| At best, Greenwald is fallaciously treating absence of
| information about their Parler use as information of
| absence of such use, at worst he's just making stuff up.
|
| > The planning was largely done on Facebook.
|
| Planning, including for the violence, was done on Parler
| among a wide variety of different sites. Actual journalists
| who are interested in investigating and reporting facts,
| and who haven't abandoned actual journalism for pure
| ideological propaganda like Greenwald, have covered this,
| including the content of specific posts:
|
| https://theconversation.com/far-right-activists-on-social-
| me...
|
| https://www.propublica.org/article/capitol-rioters-
| planned-f...
|
| https://www.forbes.com/sites/jemimamcevoy/2021/01/07/capito
| l...
|
| https://www.vox.com/recode/22221285/trump-online-capitol-
| rio...
| reuben_scratton wrote:
| Was it really? Where can I see proof of this?
| wnevets wrote:
| what private data was leaked? From what I can see its just
| public content that was archived.
| binaryblitz wrote:
| I read that photos of drivers licenses and other "official"
| cards were leaked. I believe these were used for proving who
| you were on the app. I'm not sure if these were publicly
| shared, or shared with admins who then verified the user.
| wnevets wrote:
| The source of the "leak" is claiming its ONLY publicly [1]
| available content. The fact it is being called a leak
| rather than an archive is just misleading.
|
| [1]
| https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1348666166978424832
| brown9-2 wrote:
| It sounds like Parler is responsible for the leaking, if they
| truly had no authentication requirements on their API
| endpoints.
| smegcicle wrote:
| The term is also being used in Wikipedia's reference to this
| event.
| ForHackernews wrote:
| AFAIK, they have not publicly released any data dumps from this
| (yet? Maybe they're planing to).
|
| If I were sitting on a dataset like this, I'd probably try to
| share it with the authorities like the FBI and selected
| journalists who I feel would behave responsibly.
| prof-dr-ir wrote:
| Sorry but no 'security researcher' is supposed to be
| gathering such a massive dataset in the first place. The
| moment you use a vulnerability to download any private
| information, even as proof of concept, you are on very thin
| ice - both legally and (in my view) ethically.
|
| If I were twitter user @donk_enby I would be _very_ worried
| about an imminent visit by law enforcement.
| surge wrote:
| It's also likely doing this as screwed up active
| investigations. Someone might have felt safe "deleting"
| messages on Parlor. Now that this is public, they're going
| to burn everything connected to it and it may ruin ongoing
| investigations. There's a reason Twitter keeps a lot of
| accounts active, they act as honey pots for law enforcement
| who can watch them.
|
| These hackers aren't the heroes they pretend to be.
| ForHackernews wrote:
| Apparently Parler collects phone numbers and scans of
| government-issued ID. I suspect most people in a Western
| country would find it difficult to "burn" their legal
| name and birthdate.
| sangnoir wrote:
| > Now that this is public, they're going to burn
| everything connected to it and it may ruin ongoing
| investigations.
|
| There is no way a non-tech savvy person can foil the
| federal government agency in this way - an agency which
| will likely have all the logs from Amazon (in addition to
| the data dump from this particular hack, and cached data
| from Parler follower's devices which will be duly
| imaged). In reality, any such amateur cleanup activity
| will be brought forward as further evidence of guilt (or
| as an additional charge).
|
| I am tech savvy, and I am not foolish enough to think can
| possibly hide information from a nation-state, should one
| choose to turn it's Sauron's-eye-like gaze on me. Hell, I
| don't even stand a chance against a VC-funded security
| firm with <10 people that's worth its salt.
| scythe wrote:
| A more obvious criterion would be that there's no implication
| the people who compromised Parler actually do any kind of
| _research_ on computer security. The article indicates this was
| a script-kiddie level vulnerability.
|
| On the other hand if an _actual researcher_ leaks data they 're
| still a researcher; they might be a bad person, but that's
| orthogonal.
| jedimastert wrote:
| > On the other hand if an actual researcher leaks data
| they're still a researcher; they might be a bad person, but
| that's orthogonal.
|
| I would disagree. To me at least, the difference between
| researcher and hacker is what you do with the knowledge you
| have.
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Those aren't exclusive, hacker doesn't necessarily have a
| bad connotation (see "white hat").
| scythe wrote:
| In my original post I didn't want to use the word
| "hacker" to mean "breaker-into of systems" while posting
| on a site called _Hacker News_.
|
| But my point wasn't that people can't have their
| credentials revoked for doing bad things, my point was
| that if _actual security researchers_ -- say, a team from
| some university or prominent firm -- had done this, we
| would be having a _very_ different conversation right
| now. We might stop calling them researchers next week,
| but history matters.
|
| As far as I can tell, the people who broke into Parler
| are not far beyond script kiddies, if at all.
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Ok, sorry for being pedantic.
| chmod775 wrote:
| Hacker and researcher are not mutually exclusive.
|
| A researcher seeks knowledge, a hacker seeks ways to apply
| knowledge to overcome obstacles, which includes seeking
| required knowledge and is knowledge itself.
|
| The more interesting question is in what capacity someone
| was acting, if it wasn't both.
|
| Anything else is like trying to find the difference between
| an employee and a pilot, as if they're mutually exclusive
| things.
| surge wrote:
| malicious hacker/researcher
| Miner49er wrote:
| The person who did this calls themselves a hacker. It's just
| whoever wrote this article that decided to call them a
| "security researcher".
| curiousllama wrote:
| I research what's behind your security, ergo, I'm a security
| researcher
| jtbayly wrote:
| In other words, the media really is as liberal as is claimed
| by some?
|
| How does that change things? The article calls them security
| researchers. In the _title_! Isn 't that an example of
| something that HN is tacitly acknowledging to be true by
| leaving the title alone?
| 35fbe7d3d5b9 wrote:
| The article is essentially a copy/paste of a chain of
| screenshotted messages that'd been going around for a
| while.
|
| This sentence specifically:
|
| > With this type of access, newly minted users were able to
| get behind the login box API used for content delivery.
| That allowed them to see which users had moderator rights
| and this in turn allowed them to reset passwords of
| existing users with simple "forgot password" function.
| Since Twilio no longer authenticated emails, hackers were
| able to access admin accounts with ease.
|
| Compare to this comment[1] (linked from MeFi) posted this
| morning:
|
| > Well, because of that access, it gave them access to the
| behind the login box API that is used to deliver content
| (...)
|
| Subsequent posts _also_ seem to indicate that post is
| _incredibly inaccurate_ [2].
|
| So it looks like someone mixed up "scraping a public API"
| with some breathless tale of hackers doing hacker things,
| and HN ate it up.
|
| [1]https://m.alpha.facebook.com/groups/majordomo/permalink/
| 1016...
|
| [2]https://www.reddit.com/r/ParlerWatch/comments/kv0jo6/psa
| _the...
| TheAdamAndChe wrote:
| Things have changed in the last few days. I think what
| we're seeing is a form of information warfare specifically
| designed to trigger a strong response in people, either
| positive or negative.
|
| Additional interesting things: the DOSing of Tor v3,
| suppression of all Trumpian sites, the blackout of
| Pakistan, the massive volatility of monero.
| AnHonestComment wrote:
| I'm shadowbanned for posting a video of the BLM founder
| calling herself a trained Marxist.
|
| HN is itself deeply biased towards certain ideological
| positions.
| objectivetruth wrote:
| > In other words, the media really is as liberal as is
| claimed by some?
|
| This seems like flame-bait trolling, unless the
| conservative cries about "liberal media" were referring
| to... cybernews.com this whole time?
| arbitrage wrote:
| OK, call them hackers then. I'm sure they'll be okay with that
| appellation, and won't really care about your dithering over
| the distinction.
| pratik661 wrote:
| I find this euphemistic renaming amusing. It's like calling a
| state backed hitman a 'termination consultant'
| Cullinet wrote:
| more like a judicium Dei[0] verification specialist..
|
| [0] trial by ordeal
| RoyTyrell wrote:
| Would it be any better if it was sent to Wikileaks and
| published there?
| coldtea wrote:
| Only if it the data was government / private sector data, not
| citizen messages
| newacct583 wrote:
| What exactly the difference between "private sector data"
| and "citizen messages"? Wikileaks published a ton of data
| from personal sources. Famously, the Podesta leak was from
| a private account and absolutely contained personal
| communication (about, again famously, a favored pizza
| joint).
| coldtea wrote:
| > _What exactly the difference between "private sector
| data" and "citizen messages"?_
|
| That "fuck businesses", while "leave actual people ok".
| Agaliarept21 wrote:
| I think where most people would reasonably draw the line
| is in the level of political power a person has over
| matters which impact the public interest. While I
| personally disagree with the leaking of Podesta's emails,
| the amount of political power and relevance he has makes
| him somewhat of a public figure. He is not in anyway
| comparable to your average person.
|
| I do see a public good in providing this data to law
| enforcement, so that they can obtain evidence to build a
| case against the people who were involved. I however can
| not see any public good in potentially exposing random
| people to identity theft and criminal harassment for
| simply registering an account on a website.
|
| While people could make the argument that the site has
| culpability for what happened so this data must be
| exposed, to hold that position in good faith you would
| then also have to say that a leak of Twitter, Facebook,
| and Youtube users is also justifiable. Seeing as those
| platforms have held worse calls for violence than any
| other platforms.
|
| Parler isn't a website where all the users who register
| are guilty of espousing harmful rhetoric. I would agree
| that there are some websites that exist like Stormfront
| where that would definitely be the case, but ultimately
| Parler is simply an alternative social media site with
| more lax moderation than Twitter. That lax moderation
| unfortunately will attract a large number of bad actors
| who have been banned from other sites. However this still
| doesn't change that this site isn't anything but a social
| media site with a different philosophical opinion on how
| moderated speech on their platform should be. Which means
| a lot of innocent people with no political power will be
| harmed.
| whatshisface wrote:
| Huh? Wikileaks is where people go to publish evidence of
| government crimes, not Granddad's chats with his friends.
| QuesnayJr wrote:
| Wikileaks leaked John Podesta's emails, including such
| criminal activity as his recipe for risotto.
| whatshisface wrote:
| It's generally a good idea for leakers to be selective
| about their releases (Snowden did a better job than
| Manning in that area IMO). I guess Wikileaks is between a
| rock and a hard place, because if they started
| editorializing then that would lead to political bias.
| diegocg wrote:
| Political bias? Like when Wikileaks supported researching
| the Pizzagate conspiracy during the 2016 US election and
| posted links to /r/The_Donald "investigation" threads?
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| They sided against the US government (and with Russia)
| years ago.
| 0xy wrote:
| Except the over 70,000 documents and leaks about the
| Russian government on Wikileaks right now. This argument
| is absolute nonsense given that fact.
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| Well, since it was years ago, it's possible that they
| have reversed course since then. They disappointed me a
| lot, and I didn't keep up with them after that...
| whatshisface wrote:
| Has anyone leaked something about Russia that was then
| denied by Wikileaks? It could be that the US has a more
| active community of investigative journalists.
| QuesnayJr wrote:
| Apparently, yes:
| https://foreignpolicy.com/2017/08/17/wikileaks-turned-
| down-l...
| UncleMeat wrote:
| And that was widely criticized as improper behavior.
|
| Parler is not good, but stealing and publishing this
| information is also not traditionally ethical.
| eli wrote:
| Both widely criticized and widely lauded. Similar to
| what's happening here.
| Veen wrote:
| At this point, we've become so polarized that good and
| bad as abstract principles are irrelevant. What's good is
| what's bad for the "other side".
| binaryblitz wrote:
| If the data was public, is it stealing?
|
| (Not 100% sure if private data was released.)
| THE_PUN_STOPS wrote:
| Here's the recipe for risotto:
|
| https://thetab.com/us/bucknell/2016/10/18/john-podestas-
| crea...
| da_big_ghey wrote:
| The point is that finding a vuln and investigating it to
| the extent required to prove it works is security
| researcher behavior. Actually exploiting it and dumping
| all of a site's user data is malicious. If he had leaked
| stuff relevant to the capitol riots or something, maybe
| understandable, though using the vuln to do so would
| still have been wrong.
| binaryblitz wrote:
| Just as a friendly heads up, @donk_enby used she/her
| pronouns.
| binaryblitz wrote:
| Wow. Downvoted to negative for politely correcting
| pronoun usage.
|
| Not sure what I should've expected given the average user
| of HN.
| [deleted]
| valvar wrote:
| Yes, because WikiLeaks is very diligent in scrubbing
| sensitive private information from leaks.
| tootie wrote:
| Didn't WikiLeaks publish the decryption key for the Manning
| leaks and all the unredacted messages got into the wild?
| dleslie wrote:
| IIRC, that was the Guardian, who was provided the key in
| trust in order to help publish the data.
| 9387367 wrote:
| > Didn't WikiLeaks publish the decryption key for the
| Manning leaks and all the unredacted messages got into
| the wild?
|
| No.
|
| > WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange phoned the White House
| to warn lives would be put at risk by the publication of
| cables online, a court has heard.
|
| > On 25 August, 2011, German news outlet Der Freitag
| revealed that it was possible to access the unredacted
| database of cables by using a mirror site and a 58-key
| password that had been published in a book by The
| Guardian earlier in the year.
|
| https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/wikilea
| ks-...
| BlueTemplar wrote:
| They aren't, or did they get much better at it in recent
| years?
| Udik wrote:
| If you hack a source and send it to Wikileaks, do you qualify
| as "security researcher"? This is what we're taking about.
| bdefore wrote:
| I can think of one benefit of going through Wikileaks (or
| WaPo): there would be a review by experts of what is
| legal/responsible to share, redacting for example driver's
| license uploads.
| hannasanarion wrote:
| Wikileaks doesn't vet anything, their policy is to publish
| whatever they're given. That's why Snowden specifically
| didn't take the NSA leaks to them.
| j16sdiz wrote:
| https://www.britannica.com/topic/WikiLeaks
|
| >> WikiLeaks had originally followed a policy of
| redacting personal or sensitive information from
| documents prior to release,...
| ravel-bar-foo wrote:
| One of the interesting things to come out in Dec 2020 is
| evidence that Wikileaks offered the State Department
| advance warning when the encryption keys for the Iraq War
| Logs were about to be published by their collaborators at
| the Guardian. Prior to that, publication of the Iraq War
| Logs had been piecemeal as they redacted PII.
|
| https://news.antiwar.com/2020/12/16/recording-proves-
| assange...
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Would it be any better if it was sent to Wikileaks and
| published there?_
|
| Not really. If they had sent it to a journalistic
| organisation a la the Panama Papers, where _e.g._ curious
| peoples' government IDs could be stripped and criminal
| activity highlighted, that would have be been different.
| varjag wrote:
| Wikileaks would never publish anything that hurts
| authoritarian cause, so it's highly hypothetical.
| 0x4d464d48 wrote:
| I'm left-winged with absolutely no love for Parler and believe a
| lot of people have blood on their hands for the violence incited
| last week.
|
| The security researchers were wrong to make this information
| publicly available but the fact that Parler actually put their
| users at risk like this with such a disturbingly glaring security
| flaw is absolutely infuriating and outrageous. I'm speaking as a
| believer in civil rights and user protection. Call it growth
| hacking or try to overlook this as a sympathetic mistake if you
| wish but this was a disgustingly reckless decision for any
| competent technical team to make and it deserves profound
| censure.
| throwaway4good wrote:
| I tried to access some of this - went to:
|
| https://donk.sh/06d639b2-0252-4b1e-883b-f275eff7e792
|
| Picked a URL from one of the files - eg.:
|
| https://parler.com/post/c86aa37121374606aa63439ff15362aa
|
| And put that into archive.is - eg.:
|
| https://web.archive.org/web/20210110213100/https://parler.co...
|
| All just seems to be Parler "tweets"; not particular interesting.
| throwaway4good wrote:
| Let me be clear; nothing there that you could not find by just
| browsing Parler.
|
| Maybe there is a deleted post somewhere and that could be
| interesting but since it is not marked and there a millions of
| URLs it is kind of useless.
| judge2020 wrote:
| Story is that Parler didn't delete the media associated with
| posts once they were deleted, so while you lost access to the
| post's text, the video files using incremental names (eg.
| 1.mp4, 2.mp4 etc) meant you could download videos from posts
| that might be deleted.
| throwaway4good wrote:
| I think the "story" here might be a bit of hyperbole as
| what is going on here is just an archiving of the public
| contents of Parler similar to what happens all the time
| with Twitter.
| [deleted]
| redwine11 wrote:
| Sounds like Twillo was actively helping hackers "That allowed
| them to see which users had moderator rights and this in turn
| allowed them to reset passwords of existing users with simple
| "forgot password" function. Since Twilio no longer authenticated
| emails, hackers were able to access admin accounts with ease."
| marcinzm wrote:
| As I'm reading it, Twilio simply shut down the account, Parler
| is the one who reacted to that by assuming everything is
| authenticated if the API doesn't work.
| cm2187 wrote:
| Seems implausible. Why would anyone design a system that way.
| I suspect it must be a more complicated combination of
| circumstances as it often is.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| "The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things
| got out of hand." - Deep Throat, during Watergate
| andrelaszlo wrote:
| I could only find "All the President's Men" (1976) as the
| source for that quote. While googling that, it seems like
| he never said "Follow the money" either :)
|
| https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/All_the_President%27s_Men_(
| fil...
|
| https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/W._Mark_Felt
| marcinzm wrote:
| Because you want your users to be able to access the
| service if Twilio is having downtime rather than your
| service being essentially down for them. Twilio killing
| their account was probably not an assumed use case. The
| biggest expected impact was new user SMS authentication
| which you could run after the downtime is over. Better some
| spam users than losing those potential users was their
| thought I'm guessing. I suspect password reset also failing
| open wasn't thought of as deeply because it's a rarer path
| but it got bundled together with the SMS auth code path.
|
| edit: I'm sure we've all had really stupid requirements
| pushed on us by the business side for the sake of user
| experience or increasing metrics. Or written bad code at
| 3am during crunch time.
| lumost wrote:
| This assumes it was by design, likely someone unfamiliar
| with the security implications thought they were improving
| the customer experience by not failing hard.
| OJFord wrote:
| Or just oversight, could actually be embarrassingly easy
| to mess up: if not
| twilio_authenticate(user, pass): return Err()
| return User(user)
|
| and: def twilio_authenticate(user,
| pass): try: return
| twilio.verify(user) except:
| return False
|
| Might independently look reasonable enough.
| M2Ys4U wrote:
| >Why would anyone design a system that way
|
| Because they knew that, being a save haven for violent
| white supremacists, it was likely one or more of their
| service providers would terminate service and wanted to
| continue to operate despite any termination.
| aiisjustanif wrote:
| Many businesses today still grapple with the decision to
| fail-open or fail-closed for things they build in-house.
| ookblah wrote:
| fail open heh
| krisdol wrote:
| That's like saying Amazon was actively helping hackers when
| your app allows anyone to log in when it can't connect to a
| passwords table in a shut down DynamoDB instance.
|
| Twilio shut down the account and Parler decided to pass all
| verification attempts instead.
| Jonnax wrote:
| Maybe Parler should have done their due diligence and planned
| for if their email verification service stopped working.
|
| The logic doesn't even make sense. Twilio goes down for them
| and then they just allow anyone access to user accounts.
| gsich wrote:
| Or maybe self-host.
| aokiji wrote:
| First it gets removed from Google and Apple stores. Then it gets
| deplatformed from Amazon. Now a hack that was in the making for a
| while due to political motivations.
|
| This is a political purge.
| bpodgursky wrote:
| This sounds like an incredible fuckup by Twilio. If it's true
| that their authentication verification was the entrypoint, they
| could be liable for leaking an enormous amount of personal
| information.
| bearjaws wrote:
| Hard to understand exactly what happened, but seems like a
| faulty implementation of Twillio's authy service.
| willis936 wrote:
| How is this Twilio's doing? Parler was not a customer when this
| happened. This was Parler being held together by duct tape and
| not having choices. This is what happens when a young and
| populated site dependent on services loses all of said
| services. That is to say: you are a fool to trust websites,
| especially Parler.
| goodluckchuck wrote:
| I think that depends on Twilio's knowledge and intent. If the
| specific purpose for suspending services was to allow
| unauthorized access, that's conspiracy.
|
| It'd be as if a bank's security guard quit and walked off the
| job the day of a bank heist. He has the right to quit, but
| not a right to coordinate with the robber and leave his post
| for the purpose of assisting in illegal activity.
| willis936 wrote:
| The latter is also conspiracy, and a stretch at that. What
| would Twilio gain? The most likely explanation was that
| everyone ditched Twilio as a customer and the remaining
| skin was quickly pecked off by vultures.
| fredley wrote:
| It's hard to tell. It could be that Parler's systems were set
| up to just fail the wrong way if the Twilio auth system didn't
| respond (on error: allow).
|
| Whatever the case, this is going to be 'fun' to watch.
| mabbo wrote:
| Not necessarily. See my other comment on this thread, but they
| may have failed-open when the OTP authentication dependency was
| down- ie, hey, Twilio throws an exception sometimes so presume
| the user is approved so we don't impact the user experience due
| to Twilio being flakey.
| marcinzm wrote:
| How so? Twilio simply suspended service which they are allowed
| to do based on the ToS. It was Parler that reacted to it by
| allowing unrestricted authentication rather than simply failing
| authentication.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| No, it'd be a fuckup by whoever code it to go "if Twilio is
| unavailable, just let them in".
|
| It's _highly_ unlikely Twilio 's API responds with something
| like {"authenticated": true} when you haven't paid your bill or
| they suspend you.
| mStreamTeam wrote:
| This loooks serious. I might have to start looking into Twilio
| alternatives form my company.
|
| Does anyone have any suggestions?
| simlevesque wrote:
| If you read what happened you'd know that this could never
| happen if they built their system with the minimum care
| required. Twillio is absolutely not the culprit.
| holtalanm wrote:
| I'm highly doubting Twilio is the culprit here. Sounds like
| Parler was just treating failures as valid authentication.
| Keep in mind that at the time the hackers gained access,
| Twilio had already suspended Parler's account, so there is
| little to no possibility of this being on Twilio's shoulders.
| [deleted]
| no-dr-onboard wrote:
| Call the spade a spade.
|
| There is an inappropriate use of the word "researcher" in the
| title. More appropriately this should read "...scraped via IDOR
| vulnerability."
| grawprog wrote:
| >In a press release announcing the decision, Twilio revealed
| which services Parler was using. This information allowed hackers
| to deduct that it was possible to create users and verified
| accounts without actual verification.
|
| >With this type of access, newly minted users were able to get
| behind the login box API used for content delivery. That allowed
| them to see which users had moderator rights and this in turn
| allowed them to reset passwords of existing users with simple
| "forgot password" function. Since Twilio no longer authenticated
| emails, hackers were able to access admin accounts with ease.
|
| So these 'security researchers' are random hackers that illegally
| gained access to accounts and servers are actively doxxing people
| and this behaviour's now being praised?
|
| Apart from being illegal, I seem to recall severe backlash
| against several instances of doxxing in the past, which is
| exactly what these people have done.
|
| I wonder if people would still be cheering this on if 70TB worth
| of twitter information had been leaked instead.
| [deleted]
| ibrault wrote:
| Curious as to how you would define this as doxxing? The
| information contained in this "hack" is just an archival of all
| publicly-posted information on Parler, it is comparable to
| someone archiving my LinkedIn page and calling it doxxing.
| grawprog wrote:
| Private messages are public?
|
| Also, it's hard to tell from the article, but it seems like
| there's phone.numbers and id involved as well.
| ibrault wrote:
| I have not seen any indication that private messages are
| included in this. As the person indicates, phone numbers
| are only included if they were posted on Parler by the
| users themselves, but yes from what I can tell the IDs are
| the most "private" part of the leak. Although one could
| argue that they are still "public" given that Parler
| publicly exposed the information.
| grawprog wrote:
| I have to point out. Messages being leaked is actually in
| the title of the article.
|
| >70TB of Parler users' messages, videos, and posts leaked
| by security researchers
| function_seven wrote:
| That looks like an imprecise term. According to this
| tweet only the public stuff has been archived.
|
| https://twitter.com/donk_enby/status/1348666166978424832
| arbitrage wrote:
| You ask questions like you don't know the answer you're already
| looking for.
|
| Hate speech is not protected.
|
| Take your fascist apologies somewhere else.
| beerandt wrote:
| Yea, there's no reason 70TB of downloaded data and millions of
| user accts (with each requiring an additional attack iteration)
| were needed to prove a security weakness.
|
| Let alone the creation of a coordinated, decentralized network
| of machines to exploit the attack and maximize data extraction.
|
| "Security Researchers"
|
| The doublespeak is getting maddening.
| Craighead wrote:
| Domestic terrorists deserve no quarter. There is no double
| speak, this group of insurrectionists wanted to destroy the
| rule of law. Pettifoging this reality to play the 1984 card
| is weak.
| huhtenberg wrote:
| A second-hand recap of how it was done -
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/ParlerWatch/comments/kuqvs3/all_par...
| ookblah wrote:
| i like how there's two narratives here.
|
| like i get it, personal information shouldn't be leaked and i
| feel bad for those users who weren't a part of the extremism and
| getting potentially doxxed for it.
|
| at the same time anytime this happens to a larger corporation
| don't we absolutely SHIT on them for the substandard security
| procedures? and whatever happened w/ parler is looking more and
| more amateur hour here, nothing sophisticated to get the data.
|
| just because it's some "underdog" suddenly it's okay?
| dingusthemingus wrote:
| Wiki says Parler is a team of 30 people,
|
| So realistically, does that mean like 10 devs running a social
| network with 5-10 million users?
|
| I imagine its pretty ceazy there right now after getting booted
| off AWS, google just banned u off play store, so cant use them, i
| assume they cant use microsoft because theyll ban them there as
| well, it would be cool to see if they are able to get things up
| and running again. (Ive never used Parler but i assume its just
| like a simple Facebook type webpage/apps)
| jjice wrote:
| I was thinking about it this morning. They probably didn't have
| an easy time finding new employees too because of the nature
| and controversy associated with the site, potentially part of
| the reason for lack of moderation.
|
| Not defending, just observing. It's interesting from a
| business/development perspective when it comes to rapid scale
| and team size.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| > _They probably didn 't have an easy time finding new
| employees too because of the nature and controversy
| associated with the site, potentially part of the reason for
| lack of moderation._
|
| Maybe, but I would wager that there are _a lot_ of tech
| people who sympathize explicitly with the people that Parler
| is trying to attract, and an even larger contingent who would
| work there under the auspices of protecting what they believe
| is the right to free speech, etc.
| TameAntelope wrote:
| Setting aside moral qualms for a moment, the engineering
| problems they're having right now are probably one-in-a-
| career problems, so it would be interesting work, without a
| doubt.
| Jtsummers wrote:
| > They probably didn't have an easy time finding new
| employees too because of the nature and controversy
| associated with the site, potentially part of the reason for
| lack of moderation.
|
| Parler established itself as a "free speech" social network
| platform. Part of its objective, based on that principle, was
| minimal or no moderation. Ironically, of course, they banned
| many people who came in with left-wing views. Which means
| they actually worked to create the extremist bubble that is
| now causing them problems with others.
| mrtksn wrote:
| Do you need to have many technical staff if you are renting
| your infrastructure? The scaling part probably is mostly
| handled by AWS so most of the the people there are working on
| product development, which shouldn't require that many people
| since it's just another social media software.
|
| I would guess that they spend quite a bit of resources on
| content moderation tools development as this is the bespoke
| part of their business.
| TheRealDunkirk wrote:
| What I don't understand is: if you're going to host something
| like Parler, knowing that it is extremely controversial, why
| wouldn't you host it yourselves? The money they would have
| saved over using AWS (at the scale quoted in the previous
| comments) could have paid for the servers and the people to
| manage them. I suppose the deplatformers would have just gone
| after whatever data center they used, though, or if they'd have
| setup shop in their garage, then the ISP they used. It's
| turtles all the way down. My point is that I can't wrap my head
| around the fact that everyone is just assumed to use a cloud
| provider now, and the act of racking your own servers and
| managing your own proxies and firewalls seems to be a dead art.
| judge2020 wrote:
| They were a startup at heart, and what dev with access to
| millions of dollars will be interested in running some
| enterprise VM solution over the shiny toys you get by using
| AWS or GCP?
| tootie wrote:
| Probably same reason everyone else uses cloud services.
| They're just way easier, faster and cheaper if you don't have
| the engineering capacity in-house. I'm sure they're pivoting
| to self-hosting right now, but it could easily be 2 months of
| frantic work to get back online with a system that can only
| handle a fraction of the traffic. And I'm sure they get hit
| with DDoS attacks 8 days a week.
| brigandish wrote:
| > knowing that it is extremely controversial
|
| Aside from it being sad that supporting free speech is
| controversial, if we assume good faith in the founders'
| statements then the controversy is simply the way the media
| has highlighted a section of the user base. Have you been on
| there? I haven't but I've been around long enough not to rely
| on the media for accurate representations of groups on the
| internet (or much else, to be honest.)
| ookblah wrote:
| yeah look at the recent dumps and insight into moderation
| and it's quite clear supporting "free speech" was smoke and
| mirrors. combined w/ the security lapses it's pretty
| jarring.
| malwrar wrote:
| > why wouldn't you host it yourselves
|
| Running a datacenter, especially at scale, is expensive as
| hell. Cloud is also expensive, but in return you get the
| ability to not need to think about hardware anymore. Prior to
| last week they probably assumed that AWS et. al. wouldn't
| have just suddenly cut them off, so they didn't factor in
| that risk except as a distant possibility. Up until a week
| ago we all were scared of FAATG's power after all and people
| were still talking about breaking them up.
| TheRealDunkirk wrote:
| > Running a datacenter, especially at scale, is expensive
| as hell.
|
| I helped build one out, which was later acquired, but I
| wouldn't think it would take more than a couple of cages of
| equipment in a colo facility to host Parler, especially in
| these relatively early days. Maybe I'm completely out of
| touch.
| malwrar wrote:
| I suppose it depends on what their backend actually looks
| like. Someone quoted in the data leak thread that they
| spent ~300k/mo on AWS which suggests they're definitely
| past a few cages of equipment. Who knows though, AWS
| charges insane rates for the privilege of not needing to
| think about hardware and making trivial difficult
| problems like establishing geographic presence or
| redundancy across datacenters. Parler is probably going
| to eventually need to self host anyways though, and then
| we'll see what a popular website will look like when it
| goes back to doing things the old fashioned way.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| It's disgusting that total strangers can read our public social
| media postings.
| bborud wrote:
| If this is true, the adversaries of the US now probably have a
| considerable database of people who are vulnerable to
| manipulation and who can be used for active measures on US soil.
|
| Not that I don't think they didn't have a pretty good database of
| this already.
|
| But this still is the aspect of this that I find more worrisome.
| Russia, China and whomever else might be interested could
| weaponize this to great effect.
| mabbo wrote:
| This story truly terrifies me: my team owns my company's sign up
| page. (I speak for myself and not them, of course).
|
| Sounds like Parler, fearing that their OTP provider might go
| down, decided to fail-open, ie: if the dependency throws an
| exception, presume there's something wrong with the dependency
| and that the code provided is acceptable. It never occurred to
| them that the dependency could be down permanently, or that
| malicious actors[0] would be able to realize it and exploit to
| quickly.
|
| Lesson learned: do not fail open where security matters, where
| authentication matters. Failing closed prevents new
| users/customers from signing up, but it protects your existing
| users/customers.
|
| [0]From a security standpoint, these are malicious actors. I
| would also probably buy said malicious actors a beer if I met
| them, accompanied by a high five.
|
| Edit: this is a hypothesis of course. Maybe the bug was somewhere
| else in the system- it could be in Twilio's provided integration
| library where the fail-open occurred.
| iamEAP wrote:
| More speculation on my part: I wonder if rather than a fail-
| open decision, it's just how they designed local dev to work
| and the failure of the provider caused the app to behave as if
| in local dev mode.
| triangleman wrote:
| >I would also probably buy said malicious actors a beer if I
| met them, accompanied by a high five.
|
| You would, would you? Thousands of individuals who by and large
| wanted to try out a competitor to Facebook ended up getting
| their personal details downloaded and leaked (and we're talking
| about very sensitive details here), and you're going to buy a
| beer for the criminals who did this? I assume before you turn
| them into the authorities for their 10-20 year sentences?
| afavour wrote:
| > Thousands of individuals who by and large wanted to try out
| a competitor to Facebook
|
| That is a very, very generous take. And if that's all users
| were doing then their data being breached is regrettable but
| not world ending.
| raverbashing wrote:
| The old age question with fail-closed is then not locking
| yourself out when things go wrong
|
| Everything has/should have a "break window" escape, and yes,
| that's a security weakness, but I don't see many alternatives
| to that.
| jakelazaroff wrote:
| The platform operator should have such a mechanism, yes. Not
| randos on the Internet the moment a critical dependency
| fails.
| thinkharderdev wrote:
| When you own the platform and source code, then you always
| have a "break window" escape of updating the code. You can
| also have it fail open only when requests are coming from the
| internal network, or have a fail-safe authentication
| mechanism that allows authentication with a super-admin
| password that can be used "in case of emergencies."
| user-the-name wrote:
| Pretty clear where their priorities lay, huh. Breaking the
| security of their users is less important than getting new
| users.
| mabbo wrote:
| Nah man, I won't criticize too hard. There but for the grace
| of god goes I, you know?
|
| I've had flakey dependencies. I've thought "maybe fail open
| is okay in this one case". You're growth hacking your company
| and you don't want to be held back because a dependency can't
| handle your scale. And hey, if a few fraudulent accounts get
| in, we'll just clean them up later. Cost benefit analysis
| here, right?
|
| But the road to hell is paved with trying to improve user
| experience.
| enkid wrote:
| Isn't that exactly what the above comment is saying?
| user-the-name wrote:
| So, you agree with what I said.
| mabbo wrote:
| Yeah, but you said it with what looked like a lot of
| sarcasm and criticism.
|
| I said it with a tone of "Oh shit, I could have done
| exactly the same thing". Empathy.
|
| But it's a fun point of the nuances of language, isn't
| it? Maybe I misunderstood you.
| myWindoonn wrote:
| Well, having empathy with growth hackers is reprehensible
| and worth critiquing. The idea of growing a business for
| the sake of having a big business is horrifying; it's the
| desire to explicitly build a large social institution and
| use it to damage and oppress people.
|
| From that perspective, you're the one lacking in empathy;
| you would like us to have our sympathies lie with the few
| who build businesses, rather than the many who are harmed
| by the business.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| I think you are allowed to have empathy for both.
| user-the-name wrote:
| But only one was displayed here.
| arcbyte wrote:
| You're exactly right. I love your attitude. But for the
| grace of God there go I.
| user-the-name wrote:
| Well, here's the thing. I don't go there. I do my best to
| have morals and principles that stop me from putting
| users at risk. I would push back at anyone telling me to
| do this.
|
| If you go there but for the grace of God, that is a bad
| thing. You should not. You should figure out how not to
| do that.
| user-the-name wrote:
| Maybe your takeaway there should be, "oh shit, I would
| have exactly the same thing, I need to rearrange my
| priorities so that I don't hurt people".
| idrios wrote:
| It sounds like that was his takeaway, except that for him
| it was coming from a place of empathy and not anger.
| user-the-name wrote:
| I did not hear that.
| kwertyoowiyop wrote:
| "The road to hell is paved with trying to improve user
| experience."
|
| A thousand engineers just got PTSD from reading that!
| simlevesque wrote:
| Extreme growth hacking
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| Yeah, just open the flood gates to bots. Twitter would be
| 100x as large now.
|
| Wasn't it something like 99% of e-mail was spam? The
| downsides of an open / decentralized platform.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| Maybe we should stop idolizing free speech, and instead
| work towards inexpensive speech :)
| swiley wrote:
| Of course, they couldn't compete in the competently run micro
| blogging market because mastodon instances are free and have
| no ads. Instead they competed with twitter in the
| incompetently run micro blogging market.
| nijave wrote:
| I've seen similar setups to allow testing suites/local/lower
| environments to allow less restricted access. You have to be
| sufficiently careful how they work to prevent misconfiguring
| the real thing which may have happened here
|
| Example: In production, a load balancer or other proxy handles
| authentication and passes a signed JWT to the application but
| running locally the application will take a JWT directly and
| signature verification is disabled. In this case, the
| application has multiple checks in place to make sure it's
| running locally and in production environments it has network
| policies to only allow traffic from the authentication
| infrastructure.
| MrBuddyCasino wrote:
| To give a bit of context, this is the "Keyboard Cowboy Hack The
| Planet" Parler lead engineer:
|
| https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ErcFo5tXAAAa0KP?format=jpg&name=...
| secondcoming wrote:
| That's uncalled for.
| [deleted]
| ganoushoreilly wrote:
| > https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ErcFo5tXAAAa0KP?format=jpg&name
| =...
|
| I'm not following, what does this provide in support of the
| discussion? What context does this provide other than a
| picture and username? If the notion is of this person being
| lower or lesser because they worked for parler, then you
| aren't seeing the forest through the trees.
|
| Plenty of engineers make mistakes, many are just as ego
| centric. Go to Defcon, talk to all the expert "hackers" I
| guarantee 95% of the people there make common mistakes, we
| all do.
| chokeartist wrote:
| > I would also probably buy said malicious actors a beer if I
| met them, accompanied by a high five.
|
| Take your lazy dicksucking elsewhere. Suggestion: Go back to
| reddit.
| narcissismo wrote:
| Agreed that the problem looks like 'fail open', but there is
| the additional possibility that they had no plan for this
| failure mode at all beyond timing out.
|
| In that context, and with folks with no regard for consequences
| in charge, an emergency decision to allow everything seems
| plausible.
| jimmydorry wrote:
| That seems the most likely scenario. This was their make or
| break opportunity. They should have disabled password resets
| as soon as twillio deplatformed them.
| gwbas1c wrote:
| There's a surprising amount of insecure code in the wild; and
| naive engineers who are willingly ignorant in their security
| practices.
|
| I'd assume that Parler's engineers motivations had more to do
| with politics than providing a secure platform for protecting
| dissidents under duress.
|
| (Or, if we look at the history of a recent major war, the
| mediocre engineers working for the other side thought they were
| the good guys.)
| rob74 wrote:
| To be fair, it's probably hard for a network like Parler to
| attract top talent. I mean, they explicitly advertised
| themselves as the "free speech social network" (i.e. "all
| hate speech welcome, we won't censor anyone except maybe
| Trump parody accounts") - would you want to work for such a
| company, or have it on your resume in the future?
| brigandish wrote:
| > would you want to work for such a company, or have it on
| your resume in the future?
|
| Does top talent only work for giant ad networks that thrive
| through undermining privacy (and hence, free speech) while
| manipulating public discourse to the point where these
| companies hardly have any defenders left? I suppose so,
| money will easily trump other considerations, especially
| among the naive, ignorant or just plain venal.
|
| The sad fact is your comment exposes how difficult it is
| for anyone in the tech industry to hold a sincere
| conviction that free speech is a good thing, which until
| recently would've been astounding. It's a giant backwards
| step.
| rob74 wrote:
| Free speech is one thing, building an echo chamber for
| lunatics is something completely different, at least in
| my book. In principle, we probably also agree that all
| people should be equal, but if you follow that principle
| to the end, you get Communism. That's why there is a need
| for supreme courts to interpret each country's
| constitution, which are basically just a list of simple
| principles that are acceptable to everyone, but the
| devil's always in the details...
| brigandish wrote:
| > building an echo chamber for lunatics is something
| completely different,
|
| Perhaps it would've been better for Twitter to support
| free speech then and they'd (the Parler users in
| question) have remained a fringe voice completely
| overwhelmed by opposition on a mainstream platform.
|
| Even then, the main problem I see driving all of this is
| the lack of competition, so I fully support building
| "echo chambers" if that means competition for platforms
| like Twitter that are actively working to create echo
| chambers _that they control_.
|
| Edit: clarity
| chipotle_coyote wrote:
| > The sad fact is your comment exposes how difficult it
| is for anyone in the tech industry to hold a sincere
| conviction that free speech is a good thing
|
| Twitter occasionally labels disputed/debunked political
| claims as such (but still lets them be published) and,
| after literally _years_ of doing little more than that,
| finally took actions to ban a half-dozen high-profile
| accounts that kept pushing such claims after they
| arguably literally lead to an armed insurrection. Parler
| was literally designed with suppression of political
| viewpoints they disagree with in mind from the start. It
| should be _crystal clear_ which of those networks
| "values free speech" to a higher degree.
|
| So, no, your implicit claim that it's sad that top talent
| wouldn't work for Parler because that would demonstrate
| their commitment to free speech is silly at best and
| disingenuous at worst. Parler has demonstrably less
| commitment to free speech than Twitter does.
|
| I'll be blunt: _my_ sincere conviction is that "if you
| moderate anything it means you are not for free speech"
| is not a viable operational principle. It's a rhetorical
| device. Trolls -- alt-right or otherwise -- have _always_
| claimed that moderation suppresses their free speech. If
| you listen to them, you are running a forum for trolls,
| whether or not that is your intent. It is not Parler 's
| publicly claimed intent to be doing so, but -- even based
| on the content on their site, let alone their
| ideologically-driven moderation which, again, goes far
| beyond anything Twitter, Facebook, et. al, have actually
| done -- it is painfully obvious it is their actual
| intent.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| I think we have all unfortunately seen what unbridled
| free speech on the internet looks like.
|
| I think we have reached a good balance (for now).
| Government has to be hands off, and platforms can censor
| as they wish.
|
| It's hard to say whether this will work long term,
| though.
| RHSeeger wrote:
| > would you want to work for such a company, or have it on
| your resume in the future
|
| And even if you did want to work for such a company, the
| impact on your resume in the future along might be enough
| to deter you.
| matt-attack wrote:
| So it's now just a given that all of HN objects to the
| phrase "free speech" without limits?
|
| Seems like a pretty radical assumption and a pretty sad
| sign of the times if true.
|
| Note: this message has nothing to do with Parler and being
| right or left. Just about the phrase "free speech" and what
| it now connotes.
| greedo wrote:
| Free speech has always had limits...
| matt-attack wrote:
| Well maybe in the eyes of US law, but what that's not a
| given for, well, me or perhaps others on HN. Take "the US
| highway network" for example. It can just as easily be
| used to transport black-market items, child porn,
| weapons, drugs, etc as it can transport ice cream bars. I
| support it. Tor just as easily supports drug sales as it
| does star-trek reviews. I support it.
|
| Can't say for sure, but I think it's hazardous to assume
| we all prescribe to the exact same notion of the limits
| on free speech.
| bartread wrote:
| Top talent works at PornHub so I imagine Parler would have
| done all right. Perhaps not in the area of security, but we
| can point at plenty of other companies that were discovered
| to be lacking in this area at relatively early stages of
| their lifecycles (e.g., Zoom), not to mention a few very
| mature organisations (e.g., Intel!).
|
| One of the things that's incredibly unhelpful in our
| current political debates is that there exists a very noisy
| (at least) minority on both sides of every one of those
| debates that assumes all the people on the other side are
| idiots. In general this is not true[0] and so, yes, even
| though Parler was a social network explicitly for
| conservatives, they would still have been able to hire
| smart people.
|
| I don't say that Parler was for extremists, although an
| extremist contingent was certainly present, but it's worth
| remembering that even those that are unequivocally and
| uncontroversially agreed to be extremists by the vast
| majority of people (Bin Laden, Stalin, Hitler[1], et al)
| were always able to "hire", or perhaps disciple, very smart
| people.
|
| Being smart is not the same thing as being ethical, by
| which what I really mean in this context is sharing the
| same set of ethics that you or I have.
|
| (On a tangentially related note to both my first and last
| paragraphs, Boeing employ a very large number of very smart
| people and yet, as the 737 Max debacle clearly illustrates,
| they were nursing some absolutely horrendous culturual
| issues that led to a situation where that airliner was
| certified and sold even though it contained systems that
| incorporated severe safety failings.)
|
| _[0] And the culture of endless cheap shots, snobbish
| intellectualism, and disrespectful dismissiveness that
| surrounds political debate these days is not a force for
| good in the world._
|
| _[1] At the risk of invoking Godwin 's law._
| quantummkv wrote:
| For the very reasons people work in ad tech, Facebook, et.
| al. Not everyone is a wannabe politician or a wannabe
| future founder/leader/influencer/celebrity with the
| accompanying delusions of grandeur.
|
| A lot of people just want to lead normal lives with their
| friends and family. I envy them. Truly.
| thu2111 wrote:
| Jack Dorsey: "We are the free speech wing of the free
| speech party"
|
| Mark Zuckerberg: "Trump says Facebook is against him,
| liberals say we helped Trump. Both sides are upset about
| ideas and content they don't like. That's what running a
| platform for all ideas looks like."
|
| Matt Cutts: "We don't condone the practice of
| googlebombing, or any other action that seeks to affect the
| integrity of our search results, but we're also reluctant
| to alter our results by hand in order to prevent such items
| from showing up"
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| It'd be interesting, in any case. I recall tales of former
| colleagues who used to work for a dodgy online casino;
| fancy office or mansion on an island, extravagant parties,
| etc.
|
| And online I think I read something about porn sites, who
| were working on large scale video streaming well before
| Youtube and Netflix (as streaming service) were a thing.
| kwertyoowiyop wrote:
| There are many talented engineers all across the political
| spectrum.
| acdha wrote:
| This isn't untrue but the distribution matters. Most of
| the conservative-leaning engineers I've known tended to
| be libertarian and/or rule of law types who wouldn't work
| for a place like Parler. If you're a devoted capitalist,
| you might favor larger companies with better pay. And, of
| course, if you're not all of white, straight, Christian,
| and male you might reasonably have concerns which would
| not have stopped you from taking a job from, say, Mitt
| Romney.
|
| Each degree you move to an extreme has a fair impact on
| your ability to hire the best in a very competitive
| market. Even if you're a movement conservative a prudent
| question is how something on your resume might affect
| your future earning potential.
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| Yes? I wouldn't work for Parler, but I fail to see how the
| phrase "free speech social network" should elicit some
| negative emotion. Parler sucks because they are a haven to
| right wing extremists, not because of their marketing.
|
| Its like being angry at Signal because their encryption
| allows terrorists communicate securely.
| tzs wrote:
| Almost everything on Parler and similar sites that is
| _not_ explicit calls to violence against specific targets
| and does not call describe black people using the n-word
| and does not talk about things like how the Nazis were
| right when it comes to Jews could be posted on Reddit in
| /r/conservative without violating any rules of the
| subreddit or of Reddit itself.
|
| Most of it could also be posted on Twitter and Facebook,
| although there it might get labeled as misinformation.
|
| It's actually fairly difficult for the overwhelming
| majority of people to get legitimately kicked off of most
| mainstream social media. By "legitimately" I mean by
| actually violating the site's published rules. At the
| scale of these sites there are occasional mistakes made
| where someone gets banned who shouldn't, and it can be
| difficult to get that reviewed, but nevertheless for most
| people those sites are "free speech social networks".
|
| Because of this, when you start a site like Parler you
| get almost all of your initial membership from those
| people who got kicked off of Reddit, Twitter, etc., or
| who are having to work at not getting kicked off because
| they want to post calls to violence, etc.
|
| That sets the tone for the site from then on. Hence, when
| a site is specifically selling itself as a "free speech
| social network" it almost always can correctly be
| interpreted as "a social network for <X> extremists who
| could not follow basic norms for civilized discourse" for
| some X.
| TomSwirly wrote:
| > I fail to see how the phrase "free speech social
| network" should elicit some negative emotion.
|
| Can you name a "free speech social network" that isn't
| overrun by white supremacists and Nazis?
|
| It turns out that if you prioritize free speech, then the
| people who congregate on your site are mostly those with
| beliefs that are sufficiently repugnant that decent
| humans don't want to be associated with them.
| jimcsharp wrote:
| Everywhere I go, I feel like I have free speech by
| default. I suppose it's my privilege that I feel like
| that, but I digress. When free speech is explicitly
| advertised, it smells.
| chipotle_coyote wrote:
| Yes, this, exactly. It's sad that "free speech" currently
| feels like a dog whistle for the alt right, but it's
| disingenuous to ignore the reality that social media
| sites and forums that have sprung up in the last few
| years explicitly advertising this have very much been
| going after an explicitly far right audience. The
| explicit promise is "we won't suppress your speech like
| those other platforms do," but Twitter, Facebook, et.
| al., demonstrably suppress very little speech: there are
| high-profile cases of people who have been kicked off
| after repeated warnings, but that's not actually the same
| claim. The real promise of Parler and friends is "you'll
| be surrounded by people who agree with you, unlike those
| other platforms."
|
| (There are lots of anecdotes of individual users who get
| temporary bans on Twitter for political speech, but I
| have heard those anecdotes across the political spectrum.
| I suspect conservatives grumpy at Twitter would be very
| surprised how much left-wing discourse there is about how
| Twitter protects TERFs, how they pay lip service to
| banning Nazis but don't really do it, how Jack Dorsey is
| probably a crypto-fascist, and so on. The parallel -- "I
| know of people who agree with me who have been moderated
| and people who disagree with me who have not, ergo
| Twitter is obviously biased in favor of The Other Side"
| -- is kind of fascinating.)
| ryandrake wrote:
| I agree the "free speech" label has been taken over by
| these content-outcasts and turned into a dog whistle.
| Today, if a platform markets itself as "The Free Speech
| version of X" it seems to always mean "The platform that
| hosts only content so bad it's banned from X".
| shuntress wrote:
| The description "free speech social network" is very
| heavily associated with far right extremists.
|
| Much like, for example, the gadsden flag.
| jackhack wrote:
| if free speech is only for the enemy, I fear what victory
| looks like.
| jodrellblank wrote:
| Someone recommends you some games, about one they say "it
| has a simulated theme park with intricate rollercoaster
| building engine and you compete with other theme parks
| for customers", about another they say "you're trying to
| build a rocket to the moon but it's really challenging",
| and about another they say "the interface responds to
| mouse clicks".
|
| "if a working interface is only for bad games, I fear
| what good games look like"
|
| Good games have working interfaces too, but they have a
| lot more worth talking about.
| edoceo wrote:
| The yellow field, "don't tread on me" banner.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gadsden_flag
| rob74 wrote:
| Well, free speech is a good thing, if done responsibly.
| In practice though, "free speech" as used by Parler means
| no moderation at all, so the most blatant lies and the
| craziest conspiracy theories can run unchecked. And since
| mainstream platforms are cracking down on extremists,
| your platform will inevitably become a haven (and echo
| chamber) for them, even if you didn't intend to be one.
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| As others have pointed out, yes they did moderate, just
| for different things.
| WalterSear wrote:
| There was/is extremely heavy moderation on Parler.
| andromeduck wrote:
| Yeah I checked it out for a bit a few days after it
| launched, scrolled around for 10-20 min to see if it'd
| turn out like twitter, 8chan, or the_donald in terms of
| discussion and it was really weird. IDK how to even
| describe it other than that it seemed to have that MLM
| esque or truman show vibe where everything seemed
| strangely personal but also really shallow and
| performative? None of the discussions I saw felt natural.
| It was all super identity focused with very little policy
| discussion let alone material disagreement.
| notyourday wrote:
| > would you want to work for such a company, or have it on
| your resume in the future?
|
| How much are they paying, again? If they pay on par with
| FAANG, I'm sure they would have no problem attracting top
| tier talent. If they are paying multiples of FAANG, they
| would attract top of the FAANG talent. Of course if they
| are paying a fraction of FAANG, they are going to get a
| very mediocre talent.
| _alex_ wrote:
| "Cool, I found a package for this"
| swat535 wrote:
| Or how about a system where pretty much the entire thing is
| built upon packages? Even for the most minute things like
| left-padding..
| kwertyoowiyop wrote:
| Scariest comment so far!
| 0x4d464d48 wrote:
| Hello fellow follower of the cult of cargo!
| notyourday wrote:
| > I'd assume that Parler's engineers motivations had more to
| do with politics than providing a secure platform for
| protecting dissidents under duress.
|
| If one is to look at the LinkedIn for the tech leadership of
| Parler it would not be a stretch to say that they are way
| outside of their depth technologically speaking.
| [deleted]
| jrobn wrote:
| Bingo. They most likely didn't care. It was all a means to an
| end. I would be combing this data to see if any active users
| that were inciting a call to violence are employees or
| contractors of say: Epoch Times, Members of Congress or their
| staff, members of law enforcement (especially capital
| police), select corporations or donors.
| themaninthedark wrote:
| I would also be checking to see if they were employees or
| contractors of NY Times, CNN, known agents of
| China/Russia/Iran.
|
| There are too many groups that are enjoying seeing the
| division of the American people.
| vsareto wrote:
| >and naive engineers who are willingly ignorant in their
| security practices.
|
| Fairly sure we could replace algorithm and data structure
| whiteboard interviews with security interviews and we'd all
| be better off
| austincheney wrote:
| I am certain most software engineers would abysmally fail
| the Security+ exam, which is the entry level for security
| practice.
|
| But a far more expedient process is to just give candidates
| an essay exam to see if they are functionally literate in
| their profession.
| whatiscomputer wrote:
| Can you outline what you might expect in an essay exam
| for a software engineer position?
|
| Would it take the form of a standard interview question:
|
| "Write a few paragraphs on what happens when you press a
| key on the keyboard"
|
| Or would it use the medium to ask a question less
| appropriate in an oral interview process?
|
| Genuinely curious what you envision with this format.
| austincheney wrote:
| The goal is to assess a candidate's ability to
| communicate technical matters quickly with structure,
| organization, and planning. Secondary considerations
| include the ability to follow simple instructions,
| command of written language, and accurate descriptions of
| technical subjects.
| spiralx wrote:
| My go to question for interviewing candidates is "What
| trends do you see in web development now or you see being
| important in the next few years?". There's no right
| answer there, I'm just looking for something relevant
| that shows they've got some knowledge of the field
| outside of being able to bash out code to order. For
| juniors I don't really expect much while seniors should
| at least be able to talk a bit about a couple of things,
| but having interviewed prospective head of development
| candidates I was amazed that two out of four just tanked
| on the question, one just couldn't answer at all.
|
| Candidates who know there are things they don't know
| about I don't mind, but candidates who are unaware of
| these things at all are typically uninterested in
| broadening their knowledge, and not someone I'd like on
| my team.
| mey wrote:
| Replace fizz buzz with spotting SQL injection issues.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| I'm all in favor of getting rid of the leetcode interviews,
| but it's not an either-or one, coding competency is still
| the primary concern, security a secondary one.
|
| And I don't think an individual developer would have
| prevented this; this is an issue with the general security
| and monitoring policies at Parler. I mean how could they
| create millions of admin accounts and extract 70 TB of data
| without any alarm bells, flood control and circuit breakers
| engaging?
| tehbeard wrote:
| I saw a tweet regarding it that the IP rate limiting fell
| over due to X-forwarded-for header not being correctly
| handled allowing the bypass of that circuit breaker.
| notyourwork wrote:
| When I interview candidates and their solution encounters
| an unexpected condition I typically park the original
| question to temporarily discuss how to handle this
| exception.
|
| This and more generally their thoughts on how to handle
| other types of unexpected scenarios is an important part
| of delivering real world solutions. I'm shocked by the
| amount of engineers that don't have any thoughts on this
| topic.
| MattGaiser wrote:
| It is an important part of delivering real world
| solutions. How often is it a part of being hired to
| deliver real world solutions?
| monksy wrote:
| The popular way of quizing developers during the
| interview has more about throwaway leetcode than
| experience.
|
| What you're digging for is about their experience. To me,
| what you're finding comes at no shock. The industry has
| been punishing people with experience and willing to show
| it for years.
| dieortin wrote:
| If you're referring to world war 2, axis engineers were in no
| way "mediocre".
| gwbas1c wrote:
| And many smart Germans (engineers) left when they figured
| out what was going on.
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| it seems unlikely anyone would be describing WW 2 as
| recent.
| Yetanfou wrote:
| But it is, as is WW I. The latter ended 102 years ago and
| set in motion many of the technological developments
| which define our current world, WW II refined these to a
| level which is recognisable and often still useable
| today. Electronic warfare, programmable computers, jet-
| powered aircraft, nuclear weapons - all of these were
| used in WW II. Modern computers are faster, modern jets
| are more reliable and more fuel efficient, modern nuclear
| weapons are more compact and modern electronic warfare
| has kept up with the development of computers and
| electronics but as wars go WW I and WW II were the first
| - and possibly last [1] - "modern" large wars.
|
| [1] - modern weaponry makes large-scale land war
| difficult to survive, e.g. the average survival time of a
| main battlefield tank is counted in minutes.
| jsilence wrote:
| On a tangent: This hacking of parler might be the reason
| a more recent WW does not come into fruiton.
| pp19dd wrote:
| Systems can be complicated and even the smallest detail can
| be dangerously revealing to a scrutinizing eye.
|
| "Allied intelligence noticed each captured tank had a
| unique serial number. With careful observation, the Allies
| were able to determine the serial numbers had a pattern
| denoting the order of tank production. Using this data, the
| Allies created a mathematical model to determine the rate
| of German tank production. They used it to estimate that
| the Germans produced 255 tanks per month between the summer
| of 1940 and the fall of 1942."
|
| One source of many: https://www.wired.com/2010/10/how-the-
| allies-used-math-again...
|
| This information was used to estimate force size and thus
| counter it, and it turns out this method was surprisingly
| accurate.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| Nice, I hadn't heard that one. I did hear that they
| always ended encoded messages with "heil hitler", giving
| the decoders a solid lead and verification that the key
| used was correct.
|
| On that note, using UUIDs would be more 'secure' than
| auto incremented numbers, wouldn't it? I don't like how
| much space they take up in my URLs though.
| LargeWu wrote:
| That, and always beginning them with a weather report (at
| least for U-Boats).
| jsight wrote:
| > On that note, using UUIDs would be more 'secure' than
| auto incremented numbers, wouldn't it? I don't like how
| much space they take up in my URLs though.
|
| Or just assign them in blocks that are out of order. Any
| intelligence gained from the leakage of such blocks would
| be misleading. Misleading is often even better than non-
| existent.
| hylaride wrote:
| Indeed. If you look at any report/book/etc about the
| strategic production of war goods in WW2, you'll quickly
| realize that the Germans over-engineered most of their
| equipment. This resulted in fewer weapons and more
| maintenance for said weapons. The famous Tiger II tank
| (and most of their other planes/tanks) took longer to
| make, required more maintenance, consumed more fuel (a
| precious commodity for Germany at the time), and required
| more one-off spare parts (even the tracks were designed
| for one specific side of the tank). On top of this,
| Germany had more tank models than the rest of the allies
| combined. The allied tanks were simpler and could be
| mass-produced at insane quantities, parts were
| interchangeable, and could more easily be taken from
| disabled machines.
|
| The Russians even went further, specifically engineering
| their tanks to only pass QA to last a very short amount
| of time (as little as a few dozen KM of use) during the
| first half of their involvement in the war because they'd
| be destroyed before then on average anyways.
| jjk166 wrote:
| It should be noted however that the Axis could never
| compete with the Allies in terms of quantity - America
| alone had over 5 times the industrial capacity of the
| entire Axis in 1944, and Germany was critically limited
| in resources like oil. Germany needed weapons that could
| get 10+:1 kill ratios. Further most of the late war
| German equipment was designed during the early war when
| they were doing well: it looked like their industrial
| base was expanding and they mostly needed equipment for
| well supported offensive actions. If germany had spammed
| tanks like the Russians did, they'ed just run out of fuel
| sooner. It was a gamble to go for over-engineered
| equipment, but it was rational even if it ultimately
| didn't pan out.
| jjk166 wrote:
| This and similar stories should really be interpreted
| more as british intelligence being brilliant than the
| germans being dumb. It's almost scary how many times the
| allies produced paradigm-shifting hacks in record time
| throughout the war.
| [deleted]
| cbgonz wrote:
| Hmmm... comes close to lynching a ton of people, if you ask me.
| Never mind who's right or wrong, the point is that we all agree
| upon trusting a judicial system to do this kind of thing, don't
| we?
| Pfhreak wrote:
| These folks had their private messages exposed. In _no way_ is
| that "close to lynching".
|
| Depending on what the user posted, they might be embarrassed,
| lose their jobs, or end up in court.
|
| We can have a reasonable discussion about the ethics of hacking
| a site like parler, but not if the starting point is "this is
| the equivalent of violent mobs literally murdering innocent
| people".
| KuhlMensch wrote:
| If parler is being used for either wide-spread or violent-
| motivated sedition, that might sway the court of public
| opinion somewhat.
| Pfhreak wrote:
| I interpreted the poster saying "hacking parler is close to
| lynching", which is what I was responding to.
| Consultant32452 wrote:
| Many had images of their driver's licenses revealed also.
| Calling this close to lynching is definitely hyperbole, but
| it's also true that their identity and addresses were
| revealed and their lives are in eminent danger.
| Pfhreak wrote:
| You have a reasonable take. (I'm still not sure my own
| position on this stuff.) I'm not pushing back on the idea
| that we can discuss the ethics here, only the extremely
| hyperbolic take of the OP.
| nullc wrote:
| People on twitter are posting addresses and lat&long from
| parler users. People have also been posting on twitter
| statements advocating for the murder of people involved in
| the events in DC this week.
|
| Of course, 99% of that is meaningless bluster but 99% of the
| crap on Parler was also meaningless bluster.
|
| So I think it remains an open question as to what the
| consequences of this hack will be. I don't think it's
| impossible that someone may be literally murdered.
|
| But if it happens I'm sure everyone in the causal chain will
| be as quick to claim no responsibility as the Parler CEO
| was...
| cmdshiftf4 wrote:
| All of this is _surely_ going to end well.
| maurys wrote:
| While I understand that Twilio is probably not at fault for the
| actual leak, I'm curious if they gave Parler some time to
| migrate/shift before cutting them off from their services.
|
| It's easy not to care since Parler is the "bad guy" here, but I
| do think that Internet infrastructure companies need to give a
| reasonable heads-up before pulling the rug under business
| customers.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| Twilio is far from the top of Parler's infrastructure problems,
| to be fair.
|
| The issue is that a "reasonable" heads up here is literally
| years long for some of these products, especially AWS. It's
| hard for these companies to show bad clients the door in a way
| that isn't disruptive.
| nickysielicki wrote:
| This whole ordeal really sours Twilio in my mind.
|
| Whereas AWS can plausibly claim that they don't want to host
| illegal content, what can Twilio say for themselves here? From
| Twilios perspective, providing Twilio's core product to Parler
| isn't any different than serving them to other platforms. They
| have no responsibility or liability. The lack of moderation on
| Parler is irrelevant when Twilio isn't involved with moving
| that data.
|
| For a Saas platform to abruptly cut-up a contract, immediately
| breaking the authentication mechanism for the site on the other
| end of the contract, which directly results in a serious data
| breach for thousands of users (the majority of which have done
| nothing wrong), because your employees and leadership don't
| like their politics, doesn't sound like something that a
| publicly traded company should engage in.
|
| edit: _especially_ once it became obvious that AWS was going to
| bring the site down just a few hours later. They had a clear
| route to make their ideological stand _and_ cause no damage by
| merely waiting 12 hours more.
| jacquesm wrote:
| You don't actually have to fail open. That was a decision on
| parlers' end, they could have decided to fail closed just the
| same. A service outage on Twilio would have had the same
| effect.
| tootie wrote:
| If we had a responsible administration we'd probably be
| seeing takedown requests from DHS over national security
| grounds. This isn't just a speech issue, it's safety. There's
| a void of government guidance on how to deal with this in a
| measured way, so deplatforming is the easiest and safest
| option. They can't force Parler to moderate their content and
| they can't let themselves be party to fomenting insurrection.
| Faark wrote:
| > especially once it became obvious that AWS was going to
| bring the site down just a few hours later. They had a clear
| route to make their ideological stand and cause no damage by
| merely waiting 12 hours more.
|
| AWS cutting them off probably made it even more urgent. Like
| the pr department likely wouldn't be happy with the company
| supporting parlor til the very end...
| semicolon_storm wrote:
| If there's a drunk guy trying to start fights in your
| restaurant, you boot him out the door immediately for being a
| safety hazard and overall reflecting poorly on your business.
| I don't think any reasonable patrons will see that and think
| "Wow, they just kicked that guy out because they didn't like
| what he was saying, it could happen to me too, better get out
| of here".
|
| It's a similar (digital) situation here. Parler is (was?)
| actively refusing to moderate their platform to prevent a
| literal insurrection.
| ghthor wrote:
| Jan 6th was not an insurrection, we had at mon 500k people
| there. If it was an insurrection, we'd all still be there
| occupying the capital building. Stop using words that
| aren't accurate.
| mplewis wrote:
| We?
| [deleted]
| birdybird wrote:
| "[it] doesn't sound like something that a publicly traded
| company should engage in."
|
| This is probably the easiest answer, perhaps even easier than
| anti-trust action or trying to define hate speech. Pick the
| worst offenders in this affair. Force them to clean up their
| act, or be delisted from any US-based stock exchange.
|
| These aren't private companies. They are publicly-traded US
| companies, which have an entirely different set of rules and
| regulations.
| wilde wrote:
| They ignored AWS's warnings for weeks. It seems unlikely that a
| grace period would do anything.
| RIMR wrote:
| If you suspect that your product is being used in the
| commission of crimes, wouldn't it be your responsibility to cut
| off service immediately?
| AnHonestComment wrote:
| So cyber criminals stole millions of peoples private
| communications and leaked them online -- people who did nothing
| and who are under no individual suspicion?
|
| And HN is cheering?
|
| Patriot Act 2.0 in 3... 2... 1....
|
| What's extra funny is I recognize the names cheering -- and on
| other days, they'd talk about how the Patriot Act is wrong.
|
| But these are bad hombres, you see?
| gigatexal wrote:
| I just can't help but laugh that this service existed and to
| become a verified user (or whatever they called it) you had to
| upload a front and back scan of your driver's license?? And then
| this happens and people who stormed the capitol are whining about
| being labeled terrorists and unable to fly home. 2021 has sucked
| but the fallout almost makes up for it in this case.
| NoblePublius wrote:
| I thought Twitter had a "no hacked material" policy.
| visarga wrote:
| Was it really a comprehensive data breach? Or they just got a
| list of URLs. Because some claimed it's fake news.
| mcintyre1994 wrote:
| > With this type of access, newly minted users were able to get
| behind the login box API used for content delivery. That allowed
| them to see which users had moderator rights and this in turn
| allowed them to reset passwords of existing users with simple
| "forgot password" function. Since Twilio no longer authenticated
| emails, hackers were able to access admin accounts with ease.
|
| Can anyone make sense of this? In all the "forgot password"
| functions I've seen, you click "forgot password" and they email
| you a link to reset the password. How does "Twilio won't send our
| emails any more" lead to the "forgot password" function allowing
| account takeovers? I'd have expected it to just make "forgot
| password" no longer work because nobody can get a reset link any
| more. I can't figure out how you could configure things for this
| to lead to a security flaw this bad - other than "write all
| emails that fail to send somewhere public" which I can't imagine
| anyone doing. I can't imagine Twilio writing rejected emails from
| a closed down account somewhere public either. How does Twilio
| shutting down the account mean password reset links leak?
| cataphract wrote:
| I don't get it as well. Maybe the reset password page had a
| username and an e-mail and Parler stopped checking that those
| belonged together?
| _alex_ wrote:
| I'm making a wild-ass-guess here, but it sounds like when you
| clicked "forgot password" it would text you a code to punch in
| to verify your identity. It sounds like that part failed open.
| So once twillio went away, any code would succeed.
| throwoutttt wrote:
| Good. We need to come together as a country, identify Trumpists
| and give them a chance to publicly repent or not else suffer the
| consequences of their wrong thoughts. Ideas are not free.
| kazinator wrote:
| > _Since Twilio no longer authenticated emails, hackers were able
| to access admin accounts with ease._
|
| I don't give a damn about Parler or USA politics.
|
| The troubling thing here is how the security underpinnings of an
| entire platform like Parler can be screwed over by third-party
| SaaS provider.
|
| The fact that the platform contained some "bad actors" is only a
| distraction. This is the real issue, or one of them.
| r00fus wrote:
| > The troubling thing here is how the security underpinnings of
| an entire platform like Parler can be screwed over by third-
| party SaaS provider.
|
| News flash: Twilio doesn't control who gets in, just instead of
| returning ack/nack, they simply were unavailable.
|
| The onus of what to do in this case is entirely on Parler who
| foolishly decided to default to fail-open (presumably because
| Twilio being down might impact their bottom line or adoption).
|
| If that's a "real issue" then blame the ones who implemented
| this service for Parler.
| kazinator wrote:
| So basically, "I'm unable to verify that you are the owner of
| this e-mail address now due to the third-party verification
| platform being unavailable. So, just, here you go, proceed to
| resetting the password, whoever you are ..."
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