[HN Gopher] The "invented persona" behind the GISAID viral seque...
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The "invented persona" behind the GISAID viral sequence database
Author : Metacelsus
Score : 51 points
Date : 2023-04-21 19:00 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.science.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.science.org)
| YeBanKo wrote:
| If things described in this article are true, the the person
| running GISAID is a conman. WHO and other health orgs uses
| GISAID's EpiFlu database to make a recommendation for which
| strains to use for next flu vaccines. Seems wild that an org ran
| by a conman has such an impact on the healthcare worldwide.
| longerd wrote:
| Reminds me of the 'ReceptioGate' scandal, where amongst other
| weird and dodgy behaviour, a medieval manuscript researcher,
| Carla Rossi, had invented an entire set of staff for her online
| research institute and was even emailing people from a pseudonym:
| https://thecritic.co.uk/receptiogate-and-the-absolute-state-...
|
| (Previously seen on HN here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34123302)
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Wow, what an amazing turn to the story. The last I heard about
| it, we were just dealing with a plagiarizing academic and a
| rude assistant.
| epups wrote:
| What a weirdo. Unclear what sort of benefit he is extracting from
| this though, certainly not money. And if he wants
| attribution/fame so bad, why create a fake identity?
| glofish wrote:
| Almost certainly is all about money.
|
| How would you know how the millions of dollars sent to the
| organization are being spent?
|
| For starters he is impersonating another director of the
| organization - right there probably pulling in two leadership
| salaries for a start. How many other fake employees are there?
|
| Then he is most likely the sole decider on how that money is
| spent ... the article shows that he is a convicted grifter that
| spent time in jail for fleecing people ...
| YeBanKo wrote:
| I am pretty sure these workshops [1] they host aren't free to
| participate in.
|
| [1] https://www.who.int/news/item/14-12-2022-gisaid-and-who-
| glob...
| glofish wrote:
| Millions of dollars flow to an organization headed by a
| convicted fraudster ... rest assured there are much more
| efficient ways to divert those funds than workshops
|
| If anything the workshops are legit front.
| dekhn wrote:
| I've seen women who do email support roles use an invented
| persona with a man's name. The one time I asked, the person
| explained that when they used their own name, they received a
| fair amount of unwanted attention which went away when they
| switched to a man's name.
| to11mtm wrote:
| I remember a conversation with my (now) Ex-wife when we started
| playing an MMO together regarding her nickname;
|
| They would use a name that was _vaguely_ ambiguous on gender
| but was far more likely to be considered Male than female, and
| it was for similar-ish reasons. They would still get some
| harassers occasionally (usually someone who found out they were
| female in guild chat... which was thankfully dealt with swiftly
| by leaders. [0])
|
| [0]- Which, semi-related to the topic, was often instigated by
| finding out they were my partner!
| sdze wrote:
| [flagged]
| daveguy wrote:
| What industry, if you don't mind me asking?
| dekhn wrote:
| pretty much the same one as GISAID- there are a bunch of
| people who do email support for genomics databases. Also
| cloud email support and tech documentation
| mikeyouse wrote:
| Bill Gates' team and other global health experts have been
| pushing for a truly open sequence database for awhile now --
| GISAID of course has been freaking out and threatening litigation
| all over the place for every perceived slight.
|
| Then there was the other scandal of late, Martin Enserink wrote
| about that one too
| (https://www.science.org/content/article/dispute-simmers-
| over...). Basically GISAID claimed they were the first to publish
| the original Covid genome, when nobody at all remembers it like
| that and all of the contemperaneous reports credit Eddie Holmes
| and the courageous Chinese Zhang Yong-Zhen who published that
| first sequence on Virological days before GISAID/WHO released
| theirs. GISAID has gone so far as to backdate their original blog
| posts to establish 'evidence' for the date of publication.
| They've also threatened litigation for people who claim that the
| Virological post preceded their publication..
|
| Something is seriously wrong over there.
| YeBanKo wrote:
| I am not familiar with how GISAID works, but there any sort of
| signature that authenticates data and ensure integrity. If they
| backdated the post, could they also tempered with sequences
| data?
| Metacelsus wrote:
| It's interesting that a person without any background in biology
| (Peter Bogner) was able to start a sequence database that has now
| become critical infrastructure for public health.
|
| But it seems like GISAID has outgrown his ability to lead it, and
| it would be good to transition to more responsible leadership.
| glofish wrote:
| It is because the person is evidently a con-man.
|
| So it is not as much "interesting" but "illuminating" that
| supposedly smart people like scientists can be just as easily
| mislead as the random person responding to an email scam.
| JohnFen wrote:
| Everybody, without exception, can be conned. Smart people are
| no more resistant to it than anyone else.
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(page generated 2023-04-21 23:00 UTC)