VS ontwikkelt nieuw biowapen: genetisch gemanipuleerde insecten

Een team van wetenschappers verbonden aan Science Policy Forum (in de VS) luiden de noodklok over een 'mysterieus' overheidsprogramma om virussen te verspreiden met insecten.......

Pentagons Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) voert het programma uit en is niets anders dan, zoals gezegd, de ontwikkeling van nieuwe biowapens waarmee de VS de oogsten van haar onwelgevallige landen zou kunnen vernietigen en daarmee een verandering van regime ('regime change') zou kunnen afdwingen zonder één schot te lossen....... Dat er door dergelijke terreur een enorm aantal mensen zal overlijden, schijnt niemand in het Pentagon te deren.......... (zoals gewoonlijk....)

Blijkbaar is honger tegenwoordig in de VS een geaccepteerd middel om oorlog te voeren, iets dat uitdrukkelijk als ernstige oorlogsmisdaad is opgenomen in het Verdrag van Genève........ Vandaar ook dat de VS meehelpt aan de genocide die de Saoedische terreurcoalitie uitvoert op de sjiieten in Jemen, een genocide die niet alleen met grootschalige bombardementen op o.a. huizenblokken, ziekenhuizen, scholen (en schoolbussen), energiecentrales en waterbedrijven, gepaard gaat, maar ook met blokkades van de gebieden die de opstandelingen in handen hebben, zodat er maar mondjesmaat voedsel, water, medicijnen en andere humanitaire hulpgoederen de hongerende bevolking bereiken...... De VS helpt op zee mee aan de blokkade van door de Houthi's beheerste gebieden................

Honger die in Jemen wordt aangevuld met een cholera en difterie uitbraak, opgeteld met de smerige terreur van Saoedi-Arabië heeft dit geleid tot de genocide die nu wordt uitgevoerd in Jemen.... Ofwel de VS, GB, Saoedi-Arabië, de Verenigde Arabische Emiraten, Egypte en Marokko gebruiken naast enorme militaire terreur, honger en ziekte om een volk uit te roeien.........

Terug naar de genetische manipulatie van insecten: deze insecten kunnen ook gebruikt worden om virussen onder de bevolking van andere landen te verspreiden in een tempo dat nooit eerder is gezien........ Helaas gaat Tyler Durden daar in zijn artikel dat eerder op Zero Hedge verscheen niet op in.... 

Scientists Sound Alarm Over Mysterious Gov’t Plan to Spread Viruses Using Bugs

October 5, 2018 at 9:38 pm

Written by Tyler Durden

(ZHE Op-ed) — A team of scientists sound the alarm in a new Science Policy Forum report about a mysterious US government program that is developing genetically modified viruses that would be dispersed into the environment using insects. The virus-infected or ‘Frankenstein’ insects are being developed as countermeasures against potential natural and engineered threats to the US food supply. The program is operated by the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) could be viewed as an attempt to develop an entirely new class of bioweapons that would prompt other nations to seek similar weapons, they cautioned.

The researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology and the University of Freiburg both in Germany, and the University of Montpellier in France suggest DARPA’s program could likely breach the Biological Weapons Convention, the first multilateral disarmament treaty banning the development, production, and stockpiling of biological and toxin weapons.

Dubbed the “Insect Allies” program, DARPA began modifying insects in 2017, with the plan to produce more resilient crops to help farmers deal with climate change, drought, frost, floods, salinity, and disease, said Gizmodo. The technology at the center of the program is an entirely new method of genetically modifying crops. Instead of modifying seeds in a lab, farmers would send swarms of insects into their crops, where the genetically modified bugs would infect plants with a virus that passes along the new resilience genes, a process known as horizontal genetic alteration. Hence the technology’s name—Horizontal Environmental Genetic Alteration Agents (HEGAA).

For HEGAA to work, Gizmodo explains that DARPA labs develop a virus that is inserted into the chromosome of a target organism. Scientists would use leafhoppers, whiteflies, and aphids genetically altered in the lab using CRISPR, or a variant of a gene-editing system, to carry the virus into crops. Each plant would then be infected by the insect, triggering the intended effects of protecting crops from natural and or human-made threats.       

However, the lead author of the report, Richard Guy Reeves from the Department of Evolutionary Genetics at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology, says DARPA's Insect Allies program is disturbing and an example of dual-use research in which the US government, in addition to aiding farmers' crops, is also developing a biological weapon.     

Insect Allies is reportedly backed by $27 million of funding. According to Gizmodo, there are four academic research teams currently working on the project, including researchers at the Boyce Thompson Institute in New York, Pennsylvania State University, Ohio State University and the University of Texas at Austin. DARPA maintains that "all work is conducted inside closed laboratories, greenhouses, or other secured facilities," and that the insects have built-in lifespans to limit their spread. By 2020 or 2021, DARPA is planning on testing the virus-infected insects on crops inside greenhouses at undisclosed locations.



Reeves said the use of insects as a vehicle for genetic modification is a horrible idea because they cannot be controlled and indicates that traditional overhead sprays to deliver HEGAAs is the safest bet. DARPA says insects are the only practical solution, as overhead spraying of HEGAAs would require increased farming infrastructure — something that is not available to all farmers.

The report specifies how there is currently no global regulatory framework to support this new way of transporting HEGAAs to crops, which if not supervised correctly, could lead to potential mishaps.

The scientists of the report interpret DARPA’s insect program as “an intention to develop a means of delivery of HEGAAs for offensive purposes,” such as conducting biological warfare.

These genetically modified bugs could be implanted with a dangerous plant-killing disease that the Trump adminstration could unleash over farmland in Venezuela, Syria, Iran, North Korea, Russia, and or even China, that would decimate the countries’ food supply.

The introduction of this potentially dangerous technology, the scientists argue, would usher in an entirely new class of biological, insect-dispatched weapons that could be considered weapons of mass destruction. Scientists warn that this technology would spur rival nations to develop similar insect programs.

In response to a Gizmodo question, a spokesperson for DARPA said it welcomes academic dialogue about the Insect Allies program, but criticizes the conclusion of the report, saying it is “misleading and peppered with inaccuracies.”

Blake Bextine, DARPA Program Manager for Insect Allies, rejects many of the claims made by Reeves.

“DARPA is not producing biological weapons, and we reject the hypothetical scenario,” Bextine told Gizmodo.

“We accept and agree with concerns about potential dual use of technology, an issue that comes up with virtually every new powerful technology. Those concerns are precisely why we structured the Insect Allies program the way we did, as a transparent, university-led, fundamental research effort that benefits from the active participation of regulators and ethicists and proactive communication to policymakers,” said Bextine.

The purpose of Insect Allies program, he states, is to prepare for a new era of emerging threats to US agriculture. Brextine added that DARPA is evaluating the potential environmental impacts of HEGAAs.

“DARPA is extraordinarily sensitive to environmental risks and off-target effects, and has structured the Insect Allies program to identify and mitigate them,” he said. “DARPA has mandated multiple levels of biosafety and biosecurity at each stage of the program.”

If DARPA’s program succeeds, they will have developed gain-of-function treatments that can be delivered to the “right plants” and the “right tissue,” he said. In other words, DARPA wants precision guided biological weapon insects.

Jason Delborne, an Associate Professor at North Carolina State University, an expert in genetic engineering, says the concerns seem “appropriate.”

“The social, ethical, political, and ecological implications of producing HEGAAs are significant and worthy of the same level of attention as exploring the science underpinning the potential technology,” Delborne told Gizmodo.

“The authors argue persuasively that specifying insects as the preferred delivery mechanism for HEGAAs is poorly justified by visions of agricultural applications. The infrastructure and expertise required for spraying agricultural fields—at least in the U.S. context—is well established, and this delivery mechanism would offer greater control over the potential spread of a HEGAA.”

DARPA could be on the cusp of obtaining a new biological weapon that would most certainly be used against Venezuela, Syria, Iran, North Korea, Russia, and or even China, to cripple the countries’ food supply and lead to a regime change without firing a signal shot — this the future of warfare.

By Tyler Durden / Republished with permission / Zero Hedge / Report a typo

Neil deGrasse Tyson, de populaire astrofisicus, is grootlobbyist van het militair-industrieel complex

Neil deGrasse Tyson is de astrofisicus die vaak te zien is in programma's over het buitenaardse en is een goede verteller, kan niet anders zeggen. Helaas heeft deze wetenschapper een heel vuil randje, zo is hij voorstander van Trump's militarisering van 'de aardse ruimte' en mocht het de VS lukken hier de dominante factor te worden, kunnen we pas echt onze borst natmaken.

Als de VS inderdaad de aardse ruimte kan domineren, domineert het ook het leven op aarde, iets waar deze grootste terreurentiteit op aarde nu al 'goed' in is.........

Lees het volgende artikel van T.J. Coles, overgenomen van CounterPunch en je haar zal rechtovereind gaan staan :

SEPTEMBER 14, 2018

Neil deGrasse Tyson: A Celebrity Salesman for the Military-Industrial-Complex

by T.J. COLES

Photo Source Tricia McKinney | CC BY 2.0

The idea for this article came from one of those annoying “Recommended for you” thumbnails on YouTube. The title was: “Neil deGrasse Tyson: Trump’s Space Force (USSF) Is Not a Crazy Idea.” Having written about and researched space weapons for over a decade, I was intrigued as to why a seemingly intelligent man (Tyson) would want to help promote an agenda that will literally imperil us all, namely the weaponization of space: the end-game of which is global domination in the interests of economic neoliberalism. So I clicked. Tyson was talking to host Stephen Colbert about the wonders of space militarization (by the US, of course, not its enemies).

It turns out that Tyson is promoting a new, co-authored book, Accessory to War: the Unspoken Alliance Between Astrophysics and the Military (W.W. Norton, released, tastelessly, on 11 September), which is all about the history of science militarization. The book is a disgraceful attempt to use history as an excuse to justify the continuation and expansion of taxpayer-funded R&D into hi-technology via military budgets. By now, the hi-tech sector dominates the top US corporations: Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft. Much of the innovations used by these companies were initiated in the military.

Tyson is doing the rounds on national media, including Colbert and CBS This Morning, to promote the book and more broadly continued public expenditure on the Pentagon. After a little digging, I found that America’s favourite astrophysicist is a glorified salesman for the military-industrial-complex.

TYSON’S MILITARY-SCIENCE BACKGROUND

Having graduated from the Bronx High School of Science, Tyson went on to earn a PhD in astrophysics from Columbia University in 1991. From 1996, Tyson has been Frederick P. Rose director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History.

Pretty soon, the George W. Bush administration was calling on Tyson’s talents for all things space-related. Under President Bill Clinton, the Space Command (later Air Force Space Command [USAFSC]) announced plans to dominate the entire world by force, “Full Spectrum Dominance” as the successors continue to call it. In 2001, under Bush, the Rumsfeld Space Commission, sought ways to expand the  weaponization of space to reinforce US-led corporate globalization and the architecture — satellites, GPS, the internet, etc. — that supports it. In the same year, Tyson became a formal employee of the Bush administration. One of his biographical webpages states:

“In 2001, Tyson was appointed by President Bush to serve on a 12-member commission that studied the Future of the US Aerospace Industry. The final report was published in 2002 and contained recommendations (for Congress and for the major agencies of the government) that would promote a thriving future of transportation, space exploration, and national security.”

The Final Report of the Commission on the Future of the United StatesAerospace Industry,  on which Tyson worked, makes for an interesting read. It starts from an elite-nationalistic viewpoint, namely that of maintaining US supremacy in innovation before, discussing in Appendix G: “Astronautical research and development, including resources, personnel, equipment, and facilities; Outer space exploration and control.” “Control,” no less. Controlling space is a core part of “Full Spectrum Dominance.” Tyson’s biography also states that in 2004, he:

“was once again appointed by President Bush to serve on a 9-member commission on the Implementation of the United States Space Exploration Policy, dubbed the ‘Moon, Mars, and Beyond’ commission. This group navigated a path by which the new space vision can become a successful part of the American agenda.”

The follow-up Tyson-co-authored report, A Journey to Inspire, Innovate, and Discover, also makes interesting reading. It states:

“Of particular importance to the space exploration vision is a strong partnership between NASA and the Department of Defense, where research, technical assistance, and operational assets are often shared. The Commission believes that the role of the existing Partnership Council – wherein NASA, the Air Force, and National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) coordinate mutual work and interests – should also focus actively on supporting the new vision.”

The report says the US should “DARPA-ize” (my phrase) NASA. DARPA is the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency which uses taxpayer money to innovate the hi-technology which now dominates the top-ten list of US corporations. DARPA famously brought us the internet, for instance. The report says:

“we suggest that the Administration and Congress create within NASA an organization drawing upon lessons learned from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). DARPA is a highly successful organization that is chartered to fund high-risk/high return basic research in support of national defense priorities.”

R&D SALESMAN

The high-risk is paid for by the taxpayer who then buy back the given product on the consumer market. For example: touch-screen technology now used by Apple, for instance, came out of technology developed for the Air Force.

Disturbingly, the report recommends that NASA integrate a contract system like the US Missile “Defense” program, which is so  essential to the overall goal of “Full Spectrum Dominance” (on his recent CBS piece, Tyson doesn’t challenge the erroneous assumption  that the system is for “defense”), The report says: “In the case of U.S. Missile Defense, for example, the integrator is responsible for the overall system of systems architecture, and for integrating the space, air, land, and sea elements of the architecture.”

The goal of a successful propaganda system is to sell science designed and applied for military use (itself serving the dual-functions of ensuring US global corporate supremacy and innovation in the hi-tech economy) to the public as “cool” and fun. Enter Tyson. Since working for the federal government on these schemes, he has hosted the PBS-NOVA series, Origins; worked on The Pluto Files documentary; appeared on ScienceNOW; and has hosted StarTalk (funded in part by the taxpayer-funded National Science Foundation [NSF]), which features comedians who attract laypeople to science.

Tyson joined the US military’s 15-member Defense Innovation Board (DIB), launched in 2016. The board advises the Defense Secretary on numerous issues. DIB continues the all-American tradition of ripping off taxpayers by using their money to invest in hi-tech innovation under the cover of a “defense” budget. DIB says:

“Some of the foremost topics the DIB is exploring include artificial intelligence, machine learning, workforce capacity, organizational structure, hiring and retention strategies, acquisition reform, electronic and drone warfare, software capabilities, and IT infrastructure.”

FLEECING THE PUBLIC

So, with this background, it’s not surprising that Tyson would appear on national television and talk up the Defense Department. But it’s crucial for any successful propaganda campaign that his record with the federal government be suppressed, minimized or justified. Hence, the failure (refusal?) of host Stephen Colbert to mention any of this to the casual viewer. The show gives the impression that Tyson is just a fun and intelligent man with no vested interests. In fact, Tyson lies and tells both Colbert and CBS: “I have no dog in this fight” in relation to Trump’s (read: the Pentagon’s) creation of a “Space Force.”

As noted, Tyson has been a government advisor and at the time of appearing on the shows was a member of a DoD board. In addition, we all have a “dog in the fight” of space weaponization because fragile and complex space systems could result in catastrophic failures, including miscommunications which can escalate into near-terminal catastrophe, as has happened many times in the past in relation to nuclear weapons (see, for instance, Daniel Ellsberg’s chilling book, The Doomsday Machine). Adding a space dimension to fraught and dangerous geopolitical situations only adds to the risk.

Last month, US Defense Secretary and war criminal, James “it’s fun to shoot some people” Mattis, told reporters that the Pentagon was advocating for a separate US Space Command in response to the Defense Policy Bill’s plan to integrate space systems under the Strategic Command (which also oversees nuclear strategy). Mattis was initially against this, says Space News, but has changed his mind in light of Trump’s (read: the Pentagon’s) insistence on having a “Space Force”.

With the new “Space Force” (as yet a nickname) potentially going ahead, the friendly faces of US imperialism are rolled out to justify expanding the militarization of space. Luckily, Tyson has a new book on the same topic to promote. In addition, Trump’s undeserved reputation as a moron (see my book President Trump, Inc.) required the media presence of a respected professional (i.e., Tyson) to promote the “Space Force.”

AN AMORAL BOOK

In Accessory to War, the authors write:

“A vibrant economy … depends on at least one of the following: the profit motive,  war on the ground, or war in space … Must war and profit be what drive both civilization on Earth and the investigation of other worlds? History … makes it hard to answer no … Star charts, calendars, chronometers, telescopes, maps, compasses, rockets, satellites, drones–these war not inspirational civilian endeavors. Dominance was their goal; increase of knowledge was incidental.

… The first few years after 9/11 were a fine time to be mercenary, a military engineering firm, or a giant aerospace company.”

Recall that Tyson worked to promote the aeroindustry. Tyson acknowledges that “the space research my colleagues and I conduct plugs firmly and fundamentally into the nation’s military might.” At a conference involving military brass, Tyson was directly exposed via live-feed to the realities of blowing women and children apart with hi-tech weapons in Iraq in 2003 from high-ground platforms. He writes, self-pityingly:

“Blinking back tears and fighting to keep my composure, I thought about leaving the conference. I began to choreograph my resignation from the board of the Space Foundation. But at the same time I felt I couldn’t just walk out of the sanctum of war…

[W]ithout the power sought by its participants … and without the tandem investments in  technology fostered by that quest for power, there would be no astronomy, no astrophysics, no astronauts, no exploration of the solar system, and barely any comprehension of the cosmos.”

That’s alright then. Tyson told CBS This Morning that he found a psychological trick to avoid feeling responsible, namely to blame everyone else: “I had to re-direct the causes and effects of this violence, and say, ‘No. It’s us, the electorate’ ” — they voted Bush in late-2000 (yeah, right). “If you have access to weaponry that can achieve a geopolitical goal that is noble then, I’m not there to stand in judgement of it,” he also told CBS.

MEANWHILE, IN THE REAL WORLD…

Tyson is careful to avoid mentioning that both China and Russia have repeatedly advocated for signing a peace treaty with the US, both for space and cyber warfare— not because Russia and China are “good guys,” but because as much weaker military powers it is in their interests to constrain US military actions and not provoke the superpower by engaging in the same, unless the US does it first. In fact, on the Colbert show, Tyson even mentions the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 and ridicules it as an equivalent of singing “Cumbayá.”

Meanwhile, groups are actively thinking up ways to transform military spending into peaceful R&D for a green- and other hi-tech economy.

A report by the German-based institute IFSH notes that military R&D is not an inevitability. Following the end of the Cold War, military R&D declined. But, “[e]ven in the US, civilian spending is now substantially larger than military spending.” Why, then, place emphasis on  military R&D, as Tyson does? In most countries, says the author, “There has been a major shift towards military use of technologies driven by civilian r&d, particularly in electronics.”

In terms of practical alternatives, Campaign Against the Arms Trade notes that skills shortages in the UK (the same applies to the US) means that renewable energy sectors would be glad to employ people previously skilled in the arms industry. Doing so lacks political will only. In addition, the Campaign Against Climate Change reckons that the UK could become a carbon neutral economy, employing one million people, for £19bn a year, which is about half the current military budget. This would also involve the kind of technological innovations currently privileged by the military sector.

The US transformed itself into a war economy during WWII and has remained that ever since. But, with enough public pressure, it can be transformed into a peace- and renewables economy. Don’t let intellectuals fool you into thinking there are no alternatives to war — and in this case, potentially terminal war.

More articles by:T.J. COLES

Dr. T. J. Coles is director of the Plymouth Institute for Peace Research and the author of several books, including Voices for Peace (with Noam Chomsky and others) and the forthcoming Fire and Fury: How the US Isolates North Korea, Encircles China and Risks Nuclear War in Asia (both Clairview Books).

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Zie ook:
'Star Wars 2.0: Trump wil een 'raketafweersysteem' in de ruimte'

'Trump zag onlangs alle afleveringen van Star Wars en wil de VS nu ook militair overwicht geven in de ruimte.......'

'CDA wil Nederlands 'space force' in de ruimte....... ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!'

VS gebruikt sociale media om 'fake comment' te verspreiden en de bevolking te hersenspoelen met leugens, ofwel 'fake news....'

De algehele hysterie over 'fake news' (of: 'nepnieuws') is compleet en al dik meer dan een jaar gaande, waarbij de sociale media werden aangewezen als de verspreiders, terwijl de echte makers en verspreiders van nepnieuws juist de reguliere media zijn, zie de berichtgeving voorafgaand aan de illegale oorlogen tegen Afghanistan, Irak, Libië en Syrië, plus de berichtgeving over Oekraïne (en ga nog maar een tijd door.......)

Nu is er nieuws opgedoken over de VS overheid (en het leger) die al actief negatief nieuws over de overheid en bijvoorbeeld het leger te lijf gaan met een fiks aantal verzonnen personen, die meerdere identiteiten hebben op het internet, personages die het echte nieuws onderuit moeten halen. Het leger van de VS heeft al een klein legertje aan personen samengesteld om hun werk te doen. Overigens heeft Israël al eerder aangekondigd kritiek en negatief nieuws op/over deze fascistische apartheidsstaat aan te zullen vallen met een 'snelle reactiemacht.....'* 

Overigens dient opgemerkt te worden dat de VS en Israël nog iets verder gaan dan alleen kritiek aan te vallen, daar ze actief nepnieuws zullen verspreiden die bijvoorbeeld de uitgeoefende staatsterreur (in binnen en buitenland) moeten rechtvaardigen...... 

Topmilitairen van de VS zien in deze vorm van volksverlakkerij een belangrijk wapen om de bevolking te beïnvloeden, bijvoorbeeld (weer) met het schoonpraten van de grootschalige terreur die dit leger op meerdere plaatsen in de wereld uitoefent.......

Lees de volgende stap in het vervolmaken van de Big Brother staat zoals door George Orwell beschreven, alleen gaat de werkelijkheid  straks nog veel verder dan hij ooit had kunnen dromen.......
(door de immense technologische vooruitgang nadat zijn boek 1984 in 1949 werd gepubliceerd)

What the Media Isn’t Telling You About Social Media

March 20, 2018 at 9:12 pm

Written by Corbett Report

(CORBETT) — Now openly admitted, governments and militaries around the world employ armies of keyboard warriors to spread propaganda and disrupt their online opposition. Their goal? To shape public discourse around global events in a way favourable to their standing military and geopolitical objectives. Their method? The weaponization of social media.

TRANSCRIPT:

It didn’t take long from the birth of the world wide web for the public to start using this new medium to transmit, collect and analyze information in ways never before imagined. The first message boards and clunky “Web 1.0” websites soon gave way to “the blogosphere.” The arrival of social media was the next step in this evolution, allowing for the formation of communities of interest to share information in real time about events happening anywhere on the globe.

But as quickly as communities began to form around these new platforms, governments and militaries were even quicker in recognizing the potential to use this new medium to more effectively spread their own propaganda.

Their goal? To shape public discourse around global events in a way favourable to their standing military and geopolitical objectives.

Their method? The Weaponization of Social Media.

This is The Corbett Report.

Facebook. Twitter. YouTube. Snapchat. Instagram. Reddit. “Social media” as we know it today barely existed fifteen years ago. Although it provides new ways to interact with people and information from all across the planet virtually instantaneously and virtually for free, we are only now beginning to understand the depths of the problems associated with these new platforms. More and more of the original developers of social media sites like Facebook and Twitter admit they no longer use social media themselves and actively keep it away from their children, and now they are finally admitting the reason why: social media was designed specifically to take advantage of your psychological weaknesses and keep you addicted to your screen.

SEAN PARKER: If the thought process that went into building these applications—Facebook being the first of them to really understand it—that thought process was all about “How do we consume as much of your time and conscious attention as possible?” And that means that we need to sort of give you a little dopamine hit every once in a while because someone liked or commented on a photo or a post or whatever, and that’s gonna get you to contribute more content and that’s gonna get you more likes and comments. So it’s a social validation feedback loop. I mean it’s exactly the kind of thing that a hacker like myself would come up with, because you’re exploiting a vulnerability in human psychology. And I think that we—the inventors/creators, you know, it’s me, it’s Mark, it’s Kevin Systrom at Instagram, it’s all of these people—understood this consciously and we did it anyway.

It should be no surprise, then, that in this world of social media addicts and smartphone zombies, the 24/7 newsfeed is taking up a greater and greater share of people’s lives. Our thoughts, our opinions, our knowledge of the world, even our mood are increasingly being influenced or even determined by what we see being posted, tweeted or vlogged. And the process by which these media shape our opinions is being carefully monitored and analyzed, not by the social media companies themselves, but by the US military.

MARINA PORTNAYA: When the world’s largest social media platform betrays its users, there’s going to be outrage.

ABC HOST: The study to see whether Facebook could influence the emotional state of its users on that news feed.

CNN ANCHOR: It allowed researchers to manipulate almost 700,000 users’ news feeds. Some saw more positive news about their friends, others saw more negative.

CNN GUEST: Well I’m not surprised. I mean we’re all kind of lab rat than the big Facebook experiment.

PORTNAYA: But it wasn’t only Facebook’s experiment. It turns out the psychological study was connected to the US government’s research on social unrest.

MORNING JOE GUEST: This is really kind of creepy.

PORTNAYA: And it gets worse. What you may not know is that the US Department of Defense has reportedly spent roughly $20 million conducting studies aimed at learning how to manipulate online behavior in order to influence opinion. The initiative was launched in 2011 by the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, otherwise known as DARPA. The program is best described as the US media’s effort to become better at detecting and conducting propaganda campaigns via social media. Translation: When anti-government messages gain ground virally, Washington wants to find a way to spread counter opinion.

SOURCE: US military harnesses social media to manipulate online behaviour

The DARPA document that details the Pentagon’s plans for influencing opinions in the social media space is called “Social Media in Strategic Communication.” DARPA’s goal, according to their own website, is “to develop tools to help identify misinformation or deception campaigns and counter them with truthful information.”

Exactly what tools were developed for this purpose and how they are currently being deployed is unclear. 

But Rand Walzman, the program’s creator, admitted last year that the project lasted four years, cost $50 million and led to the publication of over 200 papers. The papers, including “Incorporating Human Cognitive Biases in a Probabilistic Model of Retweeting,” “Structural Properties of Ego Networks,” and “Sentiment Prediction using Collaborative Filtering,” make the thrust of the program perfectly clear. Social media users are lab rats being carefully scrutinized by government-supported researchers, their tweets and Facebook posts and Instagram pictures being analyzed to determine how information spreads online, and, by implication, how the government and the military can use these social media networks to make their own propaganda “go viral.”

As worrying as this research is, it pales in comparison to the knowledge that governments, militaries and political lobby groups are already employing squadrons of foot soldiers to wage information warfare in the social media battlespace.

AL-JAZEERA ANCHOR: The Pentagon’s got a new plan to counter anti-American messages in cyberspace. It involves buying software that will enable the American military to create and control fake online personas—fake people, essentially—who will appear to have originated from all over the world. The plan is being undertaken by CENTCOM (US Central Command), and the objective of the online persona management service is to combat enemy propaganda by influencing foreign social media websites. CENTCOM has hired a software development company called “Ntrepid,” and, according to the contract, the California-based company will initially provide 50 user licenses, each of which would be capable of controlling up to 10 fake personas. US law forbids the use of this type of technology, called “sockpuppets,” against Americans, so all the personas will reportedly be communicating in languages like Arabic, Persian and Urdu.

SOURCE: Persona Online Management, Fake Online Personas, Sock Puppets, Astroturfing Bots, Shills

CTV ANCHOR: So is it okay to have the government monitor social media conversations and then to wade in and correct some of those conversations? With more on this, let’s go to technology expert Carmi Levy. He’s on the line from Montreal. Carmi, do you think the government’s monitoring what you and I are saying right now? Is this whole thing getting out of line, or what?

[…]

CARMI LEVY: It opens up a bit of a question. I’d like to call it a Pandora’s box about, you know, what exactly is the government’s aim here, and what do they hope to accomplish with what they find out? And as they accumulate this information online—this data on us—where does that data go? And so I think as much as we should applaud the government for getting into this area, the optics of it are potentially very Big Brother-ish. And the government really does need to be a little bit more concrete on what its intentions are and how it intends to achieve them.

SOURCE: CTV Confirms Government(s) employing Internet Trolls, Shills & PR Agents to ‘correct misinformation’ 

4WWL REPORTER: New evidence that government-owned computers at the Army Corps of Engineers office here in New Orleans are being used to verbally attack critics of the Corps comes in an affidavit from the former editor-in-chief of nola.com. Jon Donley, who was laid off this past February, tells us via satellite from Texas, in late 2006 he started noticing people presenting themselves as ordinary citizens defending the Corps very energetically.

JON DONLEY: What stuck out, though, was the wording of the comments was in many ways mirroring news releases from the Corps of Engineers.

[…]

SANDY ROSENTHAL: These commenters tried to discredit these people . . .

4WWL REPORTER: And when Rosenthal investigated, she discovered the comments were coming from users at the internet provider address of the Army Corps of Engineers offices here in New Orleans. She blamed the Corps for a strategy of going after critics.

 ROSENTHAL: In the process of trying to obscure the facts of the New Orleans floodings, one of their tactics was just verbal abuse.

SOURCE: Government Sock Puppets

NAFTALI BENNETT: Mo’etzet Yesha, in conjunction with My Israel, has arranged an instruction day for Wiki editors. The goal of the day is to teach people how to edit in Wikipedia, which is the number one source of information today in the world. As a way of example, if someone searches the Gaza flotilla, we want to be there. We want to be the guys who influence what is written there, how it’s written, and to ensure that it’s balanced and Zionist in the nature.

SOURCE: Course: Zionist Editing on Wikipedia

These operations are only the visible and publicly-admitted front of a vast array of military and intelligence programs that are attempting to influence online behaviour, spread government propaganda, and disrupt online communities that arise in opposition to their agenda.

That such programs exist is not a matter of conjecture; it is mundane, established, documented fact.

In 2014, an internal document was leaked from GCHQ, the British equivalent of the NSA. The document, never intended for public release, was entitled “The Art of Deception: Training for a New Generation of Online Covert Operations” and bluntly stated that “We want to build Cyber Magicians.” It then goes on to outline the “magic” techniques that must be employed in influence and information operations online, including deception and manipulation techniques like “anchoring,” “priming” and “branding” propaganda narratives. After presenting a map of social networking technologies that are targeted by these operations, the document then instructs the “magicians” how to deceive the public through “attention management” and behavioural manipulation.

That governments would turn to these strategies is hardly a shocking development. In fact, the use of government shills to propagate government talking points and disrupt online dissent has been openly advocated on the record by high-ranking government officials for the past decade.

In 2008, Cass Sunstein, a law professor who would go on to become Obama’s information “czar,” co-authored a paper entitled “Conspiracy Theories,” in which he wrote that the “best response” to online “conspiracy theories” is what he calls “cognitive infiltration” of groups spreading these ideas.

“Government agents (and their allies) might enter chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups and attempt to undermine percolating conspiracy theories by raising doubts about their factual premises, causal logic or implications for political action. In one variant, government agents would openly proclaim, or at least make no effort to conceal, their institutional affiliations. […] In another variant, government officials would participate anonymously or even with false identities.”

It is perhaps particularly ironic that the idea that government agents are actually and admittedly spreading propaganda online under false identities is, to the less-informed members of the population, itself a “conspiracy theory” rather than an established conspiracy fact.

Unsurprisingly, when confronted about his proposal, Sunstein pretended to not remember having written it and then pointedly refused to answer any questions about it.

LUKE RUDKOWSKI: My name is Bill de Burgh from Brooklyn College, and I know you’ve written many articles. But I think the most telling one about you is the 2008 one called “Conspiracy Theories,” where you openly advocated government agents infiltrate activist groups of 9/11 Truth and also stifle dissent online. I was wondering why do you think it’s the government’s job, or why do you think the government should go after family members who have questions and 9/11 responders who are lied to about the air, survivors whose testimony conflicts, and also government whistleblowers that were gagged because they released information that contradicts the official story.

CASS SUNSTEIN: I think it was Ricky who said I’d written hundreds of articles and I remember some and not others. That one I don’t remember very well. I hope I didn’t say that. But whatever was said in that article, my role in government is to oversee federal rule-making in a way that is wholly disconnected from the vast majority of my academic writing, including that.

[…]

RUDKOWSKI: I just want to know is it safe to say that you retract saying that conspiracy theories should be banned or taxed for having an opinion online. Is it safe to say that?

SUNSTEIN: I don’t remember the article very well. So I hope I didn’t say either those things.

RUDKOWSKI: But you did and it’s written. Do you retract them?

SUNSTEIN: I’m focused on my job.

SOURCE: Obama Information Czar Cass Sunstein Confronted on Cognitive Infiltration of Conspiracy Groups

Now, a decade on from Sunstein’s proposal, we know that military psyops agents, political lobbyists, corporate shills and government propagandists are spending vast sums of money and employing entire armies of keyboard warriors, leaving comments and shaping conversations to change the public’s opinions, influence their behaviour, and even alter their mood. And they are helped along in this quest by the very same technology that allows the public to connect on a scale never before possible.

Technology is always a double-edged sword, and sometimes it can be dangerous to wield that sword at all. There are ways to identify and neutralize the threat of online trolls and shills, but the phenomenon is not likely to go away any time soon.

Each of us must find our own answer to the question of how best to incorporate these technologies into our life. But the next time you find yourself caught up in an argument with an online persona that may or may not be a genuine human being, it might be better to ask yourself if your efforts are better spent engaging in the argument or just turning off the computer.

Creative Commons / Corbett Report / Report a typo

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