Intellectual Denial of Service Attacks • Hacker News Board

Re: Intellectual Denial of Service Attacks

#101

Post by anigbrowl » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 10:11 PM UTC

shostack wrote: post #100

anigbrowl wrote: post #5

Decent article. If you want more along these lines try Cryptome: https://cryptome.org/2012/07/gent-forum-spies.htm The strategies of information are fundamentally the same as for other forms of warfare, but the operational calculus is very different.

Thanks for the great link. I'm saving to read the whole thing later, but wanted to point out that a variation of forum sliding (or possibly another tactic, haven't read it all) appears to be in use on Reddit. The amount of noise from what are in many cases fairly obvious troll accounts introduced in important and high information density threads on /r/politics is staggering. I can only surmise the intent has been to…

Sorry for not replying earlier. Thanks for the reference to Masstagger which I wasn't aware of as I'm not a regular reddit user. Every platform has its own quirks, but the brigading techniques are easily adapted from platform to platform much like skills learned in one FPS are fairly transferable to any other FPS etc.

If you're interested in this topic and/or have any expertise in directed graphs and network mapping please drop me a line, same username at gmail.

Re: Intellectual Denial of Service Attacks

#102

Post by mistermann » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 6:31 PM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #88

Erlich_Bachman wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesn't really explain anything, does it? Fear is such a universal emotion that it can be present in any are of life, and more importantly not going anywhere any time soon. It can also be easily adjusted to any topic, because every topic can be viewed from the two perspectives - if something is good, we can strive towards it or be fearful of it's lack, and vice versa. The more important the topic, the more chanc…

Fear of the other has been one of the most powerful agents in terms of getting people to do things that they really should not (genocide, for one example). There is no flip side to that where fear of something else would counteract that. Many of those things that are influenced by a powerful emotion such as fear are like that, they only work one way or at best are very asymmetrical when you try to imagine the opposit…

> Fear of the other has been one of the most powerful agents in terms of getting people to do things that they really should not (genocide, for one example).

This is true, but it is also true, increasingly so, that [accusations of "fear of the other" as being the underlying motive behind those who simply have genuine concerns] is being used as an incredibly effective rhetorical technique to shape people's thinking.

Re: Intellectual Denial of Service Attacks

#103

Post by mistermann » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 6:36 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #57

leereeves wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would also be unwise to blindly trust these institutions, or to grant them respect or credence as a whole without considering the problems and biases of specific fields. And it should be remembered that the amazing gains in knowledge humanity has made have often been opposed by academia, as Max Planck observed: science advances one funeral at at time.

If you trust it blindly, it’s not science, it’s a cult of title and rank. Unfortunately, trusting it blindly is also necessary when you’re not active in the field. Even worse, nobody can spend enough time to be active in all fields. I don’t know how best to balance Mr (formerly Dr) Andrew Wakefield versus Dr Ignaz Semmelweis.

> Unfortunately, trusting it blindly is also necessary when you’re not active in the field.

This is technically not true. It might be a good idea in the aggregate, but it's not necessary in the aggregate, or necessarily a good idea in more specific scenarios.

Re: Intellectual Denial of Service Attacks

#104

Post by mistermann » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 6:41 PM UTC

UncleMeat wrote: post #82

jpttsn wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a false dilemma; as long as I’m not resigned to hopeless infotainment addiction, I don’t have to believe the “least bad” reporting about events that don’t concern me.

I am absolutely 100% confident that the success rate of individuals with no training doing their own research is way way way lower than the success rate of the academic community consensus.

In the aggregate, or in all cases?

Re: Intellectual Denial of Service Attacks

#105

Post by mistermann » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 6:48 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #34

leereeves wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should people respect formal education? Even in many "scientific" fields, standards are so low that most published research is wrong. The non-scientific parts of academia are dominated by in-group politics and shallow status seeking. And in much of academia, evidence is less important than ideology: research and researchers are banned not because they are wrong, but because their ideas are unacceptable. If academ…

The alternative is often worse. "The mainstream media misled me about Iraq, therefore I'm going to get my information from Facebook articles posted by Russian intelligence!" "There was once a batch of contaminated vaccines, so now I'm going to risk the lives of my and other children by not vaccinating them" "The banks were unfairly bailed out, so I'm going to keep my money in Quadriga"

> "The mainstream media misled me about Iraq, therefore I'm going to get my information from Facebook articles posted by Russian intelligence!"

Have you genuinely experienced people expressing exactly this sentiment, or are you perhaps relying on a complex heuristic within your mind?

Do you believe it's possible some people think more along the lines of "The mainstream media misled me about Iraq, therefore I'm going to be more skeptical next time there seems to be coordinated promotion of an idea that seems to rely upon fear."

Speaking of Russians on Facebook and Twitter, I've yet to see any convincing evidence that this is a real thing. I don't deny someone is engaging in such behavior, but nothing I've seen gives me confidence that it is safe to conclude it is Russia.

> "There was once a batch of contaminated vaccines, so now I'm going to risk the lives of my and other children by not vaccinating them"

Same thing, but I won't beleaguer the point.

Re: Intellectual Denial of Service Attacks

#106

Post by mistermann » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 10:19 PM UTC

frabbit wrote: post #85

canofbars wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is probably happening on places like twitter now and I know for a fact that its quite common for people to control about 20 accounts so they can make an opinion seem like a common agreement.

Persona management and state level trolling has been happening for a while now. Go back to the long, long ago past of 2011 and revel in US weaponisation of social networks: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-op... "It is unclear whether a persona management programme would contravene UK law. Legal experts say it could fall foul of the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981, which states that "a pe…

I wonder if the US 3 letter agencies have any motivation, and are sophisticated enough, to create the appearance of an organization controlled by a third party that is operating online to shape the thinking of American citizens.

Not that this would ever happen of course, just wondering if it is possible.

Re: Intellectual Denial of Service Attacks

#107

Post by mistermann » Sat, Mar 09, 2019, 10:19 PM UTC

galaxyLogic wrote: post #8

anigbrowl wrote: post #5

Decent article. If you want more along these lines try Cryptome: https://cryptome.org/2012/07/gent-forum-spies.htm The strategies of information are fundamentally the same as for other forms of warfare, but the operational calculus is very different.

Excellent link. This is what people whose job is to protect fair and safe elections should be reading.

And exactly what those who don't want fair and safe elections would prefer the general public does not read.

I often wonder, if the government is so genuinely concerned about fake news, why do we see zero effort to educate people on general techniques to detect it, but see only substantial effort to attack specific instances of it?