Ukraine is scanning faces of dead Russians, then contacting the mothers | AEC alarmed at 'dangerous' voter fraud claims | Ronan Farrow investigates Pegasus malware
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Ukrainian officials say the use of facial recognition software could help end the brutal war. But some experts call it ‘classic psychological warfare’ that sets a gruesome precedent. The Washington Post
Candidates from One Nation, United Australia party and other micro parties have begun seeding Facebook with advice tinged with claims about ballots being erased, amended or hidden. The Guardian
The Citizen Lab’s researchers concluded that, on July 7, 2020, Pegasus was used to infect a device connected to the network at 10 Downing Street, the office of Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. A government official confirmed to me that the network was compromised, without specifying the spyware used. “When we found the No. 10 case, my jaw dropped,” John Scott-Railton, a senior researcher at the Citizen Lab, recalled. “We suspect this included the exfiltration of data.” The New Yorker
ASPI ICPC
Brooklyn Nets owner Joe Tsai is the face of NBA's uneasy China relationship
ESPN
Mark Fainaru-Wada and Steve Fainaru
"One of the things that makes [China] distinct is that tech there is designed to meet the standards of government needs," said Samantha Hoffman, a senior analyst with the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), an independent research group. "There is a type of cooperation between companies that is on the face normal but abnormal in a political context," Hoffman told ESPN. In 2019, Hoffman's group issued a series of reports that linked Megvii, SenseTime and other tech firms to the abuses in Xinjiang. Citing Chinese documents and government reports, the research group said Megvii worked in cooperation with security services, including one instance in which its facial recognition software was used to trigger a "Uyghur alarm" that could be sent to police. SenseTime, the group concluded, relies on the "largesse of the party-state, particularly its investment in two government projects linked to public security surveillance as well as the surveillance state in Xinjiang that have benefited from an estimated $7.2 billion worth of investment in the past two years."
Ukraine - Russia
Ukraine is scanning faces of dead Russians, then contacting the mothers
The Washington Post
Drew Harwell
Ukrainian officials say the use of facial recognition software could help end the brutal war. But some experts call it ‘classic psychological warfare’ that sets a gruesome precedent.
The Ukrainian YouTubers turned war reporters documenting Russia's invasion
iNews
Ruchira Sharma
Three YouTubers tell i how they are helping fight Russian propaganda by videoing how their lives in Ukraine have changed.
Leading Russian scientist says Chinese have stopped cooperating after Ukraine invasion
South China Morning Post
Stephen Chen
The head of the Russian Academy of Sciences told an international conference that Chinese researchers have ‘pressed pause’ with no explanation.
The Cyber-Escalation Fallacy
Foreign Affairs
Erica D. Lonergan
What the war in Ukraine reveals about state-backed hacking.
How Silicon Valley is helping Putin and other tyrants win the information war - Coda Story
Coda Story
Natalia Antelava
As state-backed accounts fight for our attention, Facebook pages of independent media outlets are disappearing.
Australia
AEC alarmed at ‘dangerous’ voter fraud claims spreading before Australian election
The Guardian
Josh Butler and Sarah Martin
Candidates from One Nation, United Australia party and other micro parties have begun seeding Facebook with advice tinged with claims about ballots being erased, amended or hidden.
China
The CCP’s Ukraine war propaganda
The Diplomat
Sarah Cook
The party-state is using its extensive information control toolbox to artificially amplify its version of Russia’s invasion.
Tencent to block Chinese gamers' access to foreign, unapproved games
Reuters
Josh Ye
Tencent said it will shut down a service that allowed Chinese gamers to access overseas platforms to play unapproved foreign games, in a sign of tightening compliance as Chinese regulators more closely scrutinize the industry.
New tech, new concepts: China’s plans for AI and cognitive warfare
War on the Rocks
Koichiro Takagi
This article analyzes the essence of China’s intelligentized warfare, its possibilities, and limitations, and suggests measures that the United States and its allies should take.
Huawei suspends some Russian operations, reports say, treading carefully amid sanctions risks as it weighs options
South China Morning Post
Iris Deng
China’s largest telecoms equipment maker, already burdened by US sanctions, is furloughing local employees for a month, according to a Forbes Russia report.
China's semiconductor ambitions take a hit after Huawei's HiSilicon drops out of global top 25 chip vendor rankings
South China Morning Post
Che Pan
HiSilicon’s revenue declined to US$1.5 billion last year, down from US$8.2 billion in 2020, according to research firm Gartner.
USA
CIA Director William Burns decries Russia's "horrific" crimes in Ukraine, calls out China as "silent partner in Putin's aggression"
CBS News
Olivia Gazis
In his remarks, Burns described several broad challenges the agency would have to address in what he called a "new era" — characterized, he said, by an increasingly adversarial China, a "pugnacious and revisionist" Russia, and other mounting technological, climate and global health threats. "CIA will have to reimagine itself to compete successfully in this new age," he said.
Midterm politicking comes for Biden’s stalled tech nominee
Politico
John Hendel
Midterm politics are endangering a key Biden nominee who would give Democrats a majority at the Federal Communications Commission — jeopardizing the administration’s push to restore net neutrality and other tech regulations rolled back in the Trump era.
Web scraping is legal, US appeals court reaffirms
TechCrunch
Zack Whittaker
In its second ruling on Monday, the Ninth Circuit reaffirmed its original decision and found that scraping data that is publicly accessible on the internet is not a violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, or CFAA, which governs what constitutes computer hacking under U.S. law.
Steve Bannon and an exiled billionaire promoted this cryptocurrency. But experts say it has 'hallmarks of a scam'
ABC News
The digital token was being promoted by a global anti-Chinese government movement founded by fugitive Chinese businessman Guo Wengui and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon.
TikTok under US government investigation on child sexual abuse material
Financial Times
Short-video app with young user base accused of being ‘perfect place for predators’ by Homeland Security.
Synopsys Probed on Allegations It Gave Tech to Huawei, SMIC
Yahoo Finance
Ian King and Jenny Leonard
Synopsys Inc., the biggest supplier of software used to design semiconductors, is under investigation by the U.S. Department of Commerce for possibly passing key technology to banned Chinese companies, according to people familiar with the matter.
United Kingdom
How Democracies Spy on Their Citizens
The New Yorker
Ronan Farrow
The Citizen Lab’s researchers concluded that, on July 7, 2020, Pegasus was used to infect a device connected to the network at 10 Downing Street, the office of Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. A government official confirmed to me that the network was compromised, without specifying the spyware used. “When we found the No. 10 case, my jaw dropped,” John Scott-Railton, a senior researcher at the Citizen Lab, recalled. “We suspect this included the exfiltration of data.”
Health department bans Chinese cameras that caught Matt Hancock’s affair
The Telegraph
James Titcomb
The Department of Health has banned the purchase of cameras made by the Chinese state-backed technology company Hikvision amid allegations it has been used to spy on the country’s Uyghur minority. Sajid Javid, the Health Secretary, has ordered officials to stop buying security cameras from the company after a procurement review brought up ethical concerns. It is believed to be the first Whitehall department to block purchases of Hikvision products, more than one million of which are installed across Britain.
Europe
Would you click? Extensive mercenary spyware operation against Catalans using Pegasus and Candiru
The Citizen Lab
John Scott-Railton, Elies Campo, Bill Marczak, Bahr Abdul Razzak, Siena Anstis, Gözde Böcü, Salvatore Solimano, and Ron Deibert
The Citizen Lab, in collaboration with Catalan civil society groups, has identified at least 65 individuals targeted or infected with mercenary spyware. Victims included Members of the European Parliament, Catalan Presidents, legislators, jurists, and members of civil society organisations. Family members were also infected in some cases.
Dutch $1.2 billion chip initiative aims at creating new ASML
Bloomberg
Diederik Baazil and Cagan Koc
The technology involves communicating information via light instead of electronic signals and can be used in chips, which have become highly sought after due to a combination of supply issues and growing demand worldwide. The European Commission has designated photonics as one of six “key enabling technologies.”
Africa
Facebook struggles as Russia steps up presence in unstable west Africa
The Guardian
Jason Burke
Facebook is struggling to contain pro-Russian and anti-western posts that are contributing to political instability in west Africa, investigators and analysts have said.
Malawi police accused of hacking website of investigative media group
VoA News
Lameck Masina
The Media Institute of Southern Africa in Malawi (MISA-Malawi), a watchdog group, has accused the Malawi Police Service of hacking a website for the Platform for Investigative Journalism. The accusation comes after the media organization said Thursday that its website was compromised.
Miscellaneous
Apple Podcasts has allowed multiple QAnon shows on its platform, despite its rules
Media Matters for America
Alex Kaplan
Media Matters has found multiple QAnon-supporting shows and figures on the platform. Media Matters reported that several of these shows were on the platform back in 2020 — X22 Report, RedPill78, The Tore Says Show, and Woke Societies — yet they have remained.
Twitter CEO says board still evaluating Elon Musk takeover
The Verge
Alex Heath
Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal told employees Thursday that the company was still evaluating a $43 billion offer by Elon Musk to buy the company and take it private, setting the stage for a potentially drawn-out feud with the world’s richest person.
Twitter adopts ‘poison pill’ intended to thwart Elon Musk’s takeover bid
The Washington Post
The plan signals that Twitter does not look favorably upon Musk’s bid, valued at roughly $43 billion
Elon Musk wants Twitter’s algorithm to be public. It’s not that simple.
The Washington Post
Reed Albergotti
Conservatives have long claimed discrimination by the social network, but there’s no one algorithm that could prove it, researchers say
Events
Jobs
ICPC Data Scientist/Data Analyst
ASPI ICPC
ASPI’s International Cyber Policy Centre (ICPC) has an outstanding opportunity for talented Data Scientists or Data Analysts to join its growing centre. The role is suitable for applicants with between 1- and 4-years professional experience. Candidates with less than 1-year professional experience are encouraged to emphasise non-technical skills that they would bring to the role. For example, include evidence of well-developed communication skills, team collaboration abilities, or policy experience.
The Sydney Dialogue - Senior Events Coordinator
ASPI ICPC
The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) is currently recruiting for an experienced events professional to coordinate the planning and logistics of the second iteration of ASPI’s Sydney Dialogue - the world’s premier summit on emerging, critical and cyber technologies.
ICPC Senior Analyst or Analyst - China
ASPI ICPC
ASPI’s International Cyber Policy Centre (ICPC) has a unique opportunity for exceptional and experienced China-focused senior analysts or analysts to join its centre. This role will focus on original research and analysis centred around the (growing) range of topics which our ICPC China team work on. Our China team produces some of the most impactful and well-read policy-relevant research in the world, with our experts often being called upon by politicians, governments, corporates and civil society actors to provide briefings and advice.