Fwd: IMPA US spy operation that manipulates social media
Mahamoud Hussein
From: cui-zy <cui...@tsinghua.edu.cn>
Date: Sun, 20 Mar 2011 14:51:32 +0800
Subject: IMPA US spy operation that manipulates social media
To: MID <mid...@googlegroups.com>
Cc: impa2009 <impa...@googlegroups.com>
US spy operation that manipulates social media
Exclusive: Military's 'sock puppet' software creates fake online
identities to spread pro-American propaganda
Nick Fielding and Ian Cobain
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 17 March 2011 13.19 GMT
General David Petraeus has said US efforts to spy on social media are
aimed at 'countering extremist ideology and propaganda'. Photograph: Cliff
Owen/AP
The US military is developing software that will let it secretly
manipulate social media using fake online personas designed to influence
internet conversations and spread pro-American propaganda.
A Californian corporation has been awarded a contract with the US Central
Command (Centcom) to develop what is described as an "online persona
management service" that will allow one serviceman or woman to control up
to 10 separate identities at once.
The contract stipulates each persona must have a convincing background,
history and supporting details, and that up to 50 controllers must be able
to operate false identities from their workstations "without fear of being
discovered by sophisticated adversaries".
The project has been likened by web experts to China's attempts to control
and restrict free speech on the internet.
Centcom's contract requires the provision of one "virtual private server"
in the United States and eight appearing to be outside the US to give the
impression the fake personas are real people located in different parts of
the world. It calls for "traffic mixing", blending the persona
controllers' internet usage with the usage of people outside Centcom in a
manner that must offer "excellent cover and powerful deniability".
Once developed the software could allow US service personnel, working
around the clock in one location, to respond to emerging online
conversations with a host of co-ordinated blogposts, tweets, retweets,
chatroom posts and other interventions. Details of the contract suggest
this location would be MacDill air force base near Tampa, Florida, home of
US Special Operations Command.
Centcom spokesman Commander Bill Speaks said: "The technology supports
classified blogging activities on foreign-language websites to enable
Centcom to counter violent extremist and enemy propaganda outside the US."
He said none of the interventions was in English, as it would be unlawful
to "address US audiences" with such technology, and any English-language
use of social media by Centcom was always clearly attributed. The
languages in which the interventions are conducted include Arabic, Farsi,
Urdu and Pashto.
The multiple persona contract is thought to have been awarded as part of a
programme called Operation Earnest Voice (OEV), which was first developed
in Iraq as a psychological warfare weapon against the online presence of
al-Qaida supporters and others ranged against coalition forces. Since then
OEV is reported to have expanded into a $200m programme and is thought to
have been used against jihadists across Pakistan, Afghanistan and the
Middle East.
OEV is seen by senior US commanders as a vital counter-terrorism and
counter-radicalisation programme. In evidence to the US Senate's armed
services committee last year, General David Petraeus, then commander of
Centcom, described the operation as an effort to "counter extremist
ideology and propaganda and to ensure that credible voices in the region
are heard". He said the US military's objective was to be "first with the
truth".
This month Petraeus's successor, General James Mattis, told the same
committee that OEV "supports all activities associated with degrading the
enemy narrative, including web engagement and web-based product
distribution capabilities".
The discovery that the US military is developing false online
personalities – known to users of social media as "sock puppets" – could
encourage other governments, private companies and non-government
organisations to do the same.
Critics are likely to complain that it will allow the US military to
create a false consensus in online conversations, crowd out unwelcome
opinions and smother commentaries or reports that do not correspond with
its own objectives.
Centcom confirmed that the $2.76m contract was awarded to Ntrepid, a newly
formed corporation registered in Los Angeles. It would not disclose
whether the multiple persona project is in operation or discuss any
related contracts.
Nobody was available for comment at Ntrepid.
In his evidence to the Senate committee, Gen Mattis said: "OEV seeks to
disrupt recruitment and training of suicide bombers; deny safe havens for
our adversaries; and counter extremist ideology and propaganda." Centcom
was working with "our coalition partners" to develop new techniques and
tactics that the US could use "to counter the adversary in the cyber
domain".
According to a report by the inspector general of the US defence
department in Iraq,, OEV was managed by the multinational forces rather
than Centcom.
Asked whether any UK military personnel had been involved in OEV,
Britain's Ministry of Defence said it could find "no evidence". The MoD
refused to say whether it had been involved in the development of persona
management programmes, however, saying: "We don't comment on cyber
capability."
OEV was discussed last year at a gathering of electronic warfare
specialists in Washington DC, where a senior Centcom officer told
delegates that its purpose was to "communicate critical messages and to
counter the propaganda of our adversaries".
Persona management by the US military would face legal challenges if it
were turned against citizens of the US, where a number of people engaged
in sock puppetry have faced prosecution.
Last year a New York lawyer who impersonated a scholar was sentenced to
jail after being convicted of "criminal impersonation" and identity theft.
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 person is guilty of forgery
if he makes a false instrument, with the intention that he or another
shall use it to induce somebody to accept it as genuine, and by reason of
so accepting it to do or not to do some act to his own or any other
person's prejudice". However, this would apply only if a website or social
network could be shown to have suffered "prejudice" as a result.
[There's a number of very witty comments:
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-social-networks>
2011-03-20
cui-zy
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Mahamoud Mohamed Hussein
Dean, Faculty of Social Science
Puntland State University
Garowe, Puntland, Somalia
Tel: +252 90 756027
Email: raya...@gmail.com
Website: http://www.puntlandstateuniversity.com