dukeanthony
New Member
Conservative institutions like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce have seized U.S. military computer software and have turned it on American citizens. The technology that is being used is called persona management systems, and it allows one internet user to appear as though they are 10, 50, 70, or more users online. The uses for such software are many, including military applications such as subverting online activities of violent extremists (al-Qaida), as well as countering enemy propaganda (WikiLeaks) outside the US, but it has most recently been employed against domestic initiatives to regulate greenhouse gases and the development of a clean energy industry by organizations that have no business using U.S. military psychological weapons against American citizens.
The computer software was first developed by military contractors during the Iraq war; it was then expanded to be used against jihadists across Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the Middle East. The software was used in an effort to influence online conversations and steer trends in a programmed manner; it is considered part of the military's psychological weaponry arsenal. [1]
The use of computer software to assume false identities online is not necessarily legal, but the official legality of it depends on who it is being used against. The online management of multiple personalities is called sockpuppetry in more casual circles. While the military use of persona management software against foreign adversaries is legal, its use against U.S. citizens is not, and there are instances where those individuals and institutions that have engaged in sockpuppetry have faced prosecution. [1]
Sockpupettry in its early days was pretty innocent. It was simply an attempt by online writers to make their webpages seem more popular by posting multiple comments on the bottom of their posts pretending to be several different people. It was considered to be part of the first wave of the phenomenon known as astroturfing, the creation of fake support for an otherwise unpopular idea; in most cases, it was used as part of campaigns focused on pushing corporate agendas.
But in the most recent midterm election cycle in the U.S., we saw the phenomenon of astroturfing and sockpuppetry thrust into politics on a scale not seen before. These fake movements around false information moved into national politics through the creation of the Tea Party, which has quickly been absorbed into the Republican base.
The Tea Party is nothing but a fake grassroot movement that was created by powerful fossil fuel interests as an answer to the Democrats dominance on policy early in Barack Obama's presidency. [17] Moves to broaden healthcare coverage and then expand regulation of emissions in America was seen as a direct threat to the established global paradigm of externalizing risks while privatizing profits enjoyed for nearly a decade under Bush/Cheney. When power switched hands in 2008 and a wave of change swept over America, corporations that had benefited immensely from the lax regulations of Cheney's secret energy policy crafted an elaborate campaign that involved false information and fake groups that would give the appearance that there was more support for their ideas than there really was in reality. How could policies that only benefit 2% of the American population at such great cost to the vast majority of citizens in this country gain any traction without the use of some kind of internet technology that could transform one person into many in the digital world online where more and more people are getting their information from?
After the Tea Party was swept up under the Republican umbrella, the billionaires' astroturf campaign was incorporated into the political mainstream, giving it and its creators more power than they had hoped for. How did the Tea Party movement gain so much power in such a short period of time? How are their leaders in Congress able now to push bills through that seek to dismantle Supreme Court mandates based upon Congressionally approved legislation? Why would they seek to negate the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts that obviously benefit every single American on the most basic of levels?
The answers to these questions are pretty simple; the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts are bad for business; they are, however, good for people. There are probably a lot of people in the rural parts of Pennsylvania who wish they could go back in time and change their votes in light of the fracking epidemic that is now plaguing their state threatening to toxify their drinking water and send their emission levels to levels only seem in America's major cities. [20]
First, it is important to point out that most people now are getting their political information online; more and more, people are turning to social media networks to get information about issues and candidates. In fact, a majority of Americans engaged in campaign related activities online in the 2010 midterm elections. [15] It is well documented that this trend of online political users is growing and will play a major role in the 2012 presidential election. [16]
The Koch brothers and other energy industry billionaires, who would prefer to dismantle America's laws instead of adapt their corporate strategies, have realized this online trend and have employed the use of internet computer software technology formerly reserved for America's enemies abroad and have turned it on American citizens in the hope of intimidating and ultimately silencing their political opponents, thus usurping American democracy.
Anyone who reads particular topics regularly online has noticed it. The topics of clean energy, energy policy, climate change, environmental responsibility, or sustainability draw the most attention from sockpuppeteers. Articles that gain even modest attention through Google's search engines, within hours, attract a swarm of very angry, non-eloquent users who spew short bursts of vitriolic vomit in the comment sections. This is done in an effort to discredit the piece as well as create a bandwagon effect for those people who look to others to find out what to think about complex topics. This would not be a problem if the comments were representative of Americans' thoughts, but it now seems apparent that, particularly with the issue of climate change and energy policy, that the comment sections of articles on these topics are being targeted by energy moguls using the military's persona management software. In other words, most strings of comments at the base of these articles are made by one person appearing to be up to as many as 70 different people, all armed with their own webpages, email, business front, and trappings of Joe average concerned citizen so as not to draw suspicion. In reality, this person is employed by someone in the energy industry to monitor the internet, seek out articles contrary to the industry position, and bomb them with negative vitriol.
The software that is used is capable of creating detailed backgrounds complete with webpage, email, and a genuine business front in order to make their 'expertise' seem more believable. The software even is able to make the created personas appear as though they are coming from any location in the world so as to prevent further suspicion, as well as the diversity of opposition. Some more sophisticated software is capable of commenting on live streams even when its operator is not present [3]; in essence, online comments, in some instances, has been automated.
These online robots have now been tied to online climate change deniers; [9] but the campaign against representative democracy does not stop there. The software has been used by conservative organizations to target labor unions, progressive organizations, journalists, and progressive bloggers. [4] The scene in Wisconsin that has spread across the country is indicative of of this trend; a relatively small group of people seized power under the guise that they were the majority, and when they tried to implement their ideas, they met stiff resistance from the actual majority. [18]
So, where did this information come from; how was it exposed that energy billionaires like the Kochs were paying for military software to be used against American citizens? This part of the story is actually quite interesting. A company named HBGary Federal, a U.S. military contractor, is in some pretty hot water after the cyber-activist group Anonymous hacked into the company's email stream and published the contents of some 60,000 emails online. [10] HBGary Federal makes persona management software, and part of the email cache that was published online revealed their connection not only to attempts to discredit WikiLeaks and sympathetic journalists to the cause, but also to organizations that were actively involved in influencing domestic political campaigns through the use of persona management software. [5] While HBGary Federal was targeted for its attack on WikiLeaks, other more interesting information was discovered in the email cache, and it is that information that brought the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's use of military persona management software to light. [11]
It doesn't appear that liberal cyber-activist groups like Anonymous are alone in their efforts to mine embarrassing or criminal behavior from their political adversaries in the hope of influencing public opinion. This cyber war between Republican and Democrat operatives shows no signs of cooling down before the 2012 election.
In light of the email dump, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has now been linked to HBGary in their efforts to snoop on families of liberal activists, creating and managing multiple personas online in an effort to influence public opinion, using internet-bots to troll social media scouring for information, and setting media traps baited with false information in an attempt to discredit liberal news sources. [7] The whole NPR fiasco and general attack on public television is part of this campaign. The powerful billionaires who created the Tea Party and who have now infiltrated American democracy in the hope of influencing energy legislation are now poised to not only influence it, but repeal existing protections and rewrite new policy that thrusts corporate interests even further ahead of basic human needs.
This effort to influence public opinion is as old as time, but the use of automated computer software to deliberately mislead American people is straight out of a science fiction novel. Its use by conservative organizations in mainstream politics today, however, has been confirmed, and astroturfing online is seemingly the new trend being employed by corporate interests in an effort to influence online 'discussions'. So, reader beware, those comment threads aren't what they seem. [8]
The emails that were stolen and published online showed that HBGary Federal is involved in creating software that would allow its users to assume multiple identities online, formerly for military use solely (that's no secret); but through Anonymous' attempt to expose HBGary Federal's effort to discredit the website WikiLeaks, evidence was uncovered that shows that HBGary Federal stepped over the line of legality by arming the U.S. Chamber of Commerce with military-grade psychological weaponry to be used against American citizens. [19] What that means for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and their plan to dismantle the Clean Air Act as well as the EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gases is left to be seen. It was Bank of America that contracted HBGary Federal to discredit WikiLeaks over concerns regarding WikiLeaks' next dump which was rumored to be about shady dealings during the financial crash. Now, Congress is being asked to investigate the matter, but a Republican controlled House might not see through to the importance of investigating this matter fully right now. [13]
Cyber-warfare for the hearts and minds of Americans, it seems, is what American democracy has come down to. Some could make the argument that American democracy was usurped by capitalism's marketing principles a long time ago and only perfected in the modern age under Presidents Reagan and Clinton. Whatever the trend, it appears as though the debate going on surrounding unions, energy, climate change, and healthcare is all fabricated; there is no debate. Americans support Unions, they want energy reform, they know that climate change is happening and is linked to human emissions, and they want universal healthcare; the 'debate' is being manufactured by a relatively few bunch of people amplifying their voices using computer software that was designed to be used against America's enemies in the Middle East.
The plan to turn democracy into a permanent marketing campaign has been around for some time now, some say tracing its roots back to Sigmund Freud's breakthrough ideas. We are all programmable. Freud talked about inner desires in humanity's psyche. It used to be the television that was used in democracies to program the inner desires of the masses; it appears that the internet has now taken the baton from the television as democracy's deliverer of propaganda.
The computer software was first developed by military contractors during the Iraq war; it was then expanded to be used against jihadists across Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the Middle East. The software was used in an effort to influence online conversations and steer trends in a programmed manner; it is considered part of the military's psychological weaponry arsenal. [1]
The use of computer software to assume false identities online is not necessarily legal, but the official legality of it depends on who it is being used against. The online management of multiple personalities is called sockpuppetry in more casual circles. While the military use of persona management software against foreign adversaries is legal, its use against U.S. citizens is not, and there are instances where those individuals and institutions that have engaged in sockpuppetry have faced prosecution. [1]
Sockpupettry in its early days was pretty innocent. It was simply an attempt by online writers to make their webpages seem more popular by posting multiple comments on the bottom of their posts pretending to be several different people. It was considered to be part of the first wave of the phenomenon known as astroturfing, the creation of fake support for an otherwise unpopular idea; in most cases, it was used as part of campaigns focused on pushing corporate agendas.
But in the most recent midterm election cycle in the U.S., we saw the phenomenon of astroturfing and sockpuppetry thrust into politics on a scale not seen before. These fake movements around false information moved into national politics through the creation of the Tea Party, which has quickly been absorbed into the Republican base.
The Tea Party is nothing but a fake grassroot movement that was created by powerful fossil fuel interests as an answer to the Democrats dominance on policy early in Barack Obama's presidency. [17] Moves to broaden healthcare coverage and then expand regulation of emissions in America was seen as a direct threat to the established global paradigm of externalizing risks while privatizing profits enjoyed for nearly a decade under Bush/Cheney. When power switched hands in 2008 and a wave of change swept over America, corporations that had benefited immensely from the lax regulations of Cheney's secret energy policy crafted an elaborate campaign that involved false information and fake groups that would give the appearance that there was more support for their ideas than there really was in reality. How could policies that only benefit 2% of the American population at such great cost to the vast majority of citizens in this country gain any traction without the use of some kind of internet technology that could transform one person into many in the digital world online where more and more people are getting their information from?
After the Tea Party was swept up under the Republican umbrella, the billionaires' astroturf campaign was incorporated into the political mainstream, giving it and its creators more power than they had hoped for. How did the Tea Party movement gain so much power in such a short period of time? How are their leaders in Congress able now to push bills through that seek to dismantle Supreme Court mandates based upon Congressionally approved legislation? Why would they seek to negate the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts that obviously benefit every single American on the most basic of levels?
The answers to these questions are pretty simple; the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts are bad for business; they are, however, good for people. There are probably a lot of people in the rural parts of Pennsylvania who wish they could go back in time and change their votes in light of the fracking epidemic that is now plaguing their state threatening to toxify their drinking water and send their emission levels to levels only seem in America's major cities. [20]
First, it is important to point out that most people now are getting their political information online; more and more, people are turning to social media networks to get information about issues and candidates. In fact, a majority of Americans engaged in campaign related activities online in the 2010 midterm elections. [15] It is well documented that this trend of online political users is growing and will play a major role in the 2012 presidential election. [16]
The Koch brothers and other energy industry billionaires, who would prefer to dismantle America's laws instead of adapt their corporate strategies, have realized this online trend and have employed the use of internet computer software technology formerly reserved for America's enemies abroad and have turned it on American citizens in the hope of intimidating and ultimately silencing their political opponents, thus usurping American democracy.
Anyone who reads particular topics regularly online has noticed it. The topics of clean energy, energy policy, climate change, environmental responsibility, or sustainability draw the most attention from sockpuppeteers. Articles that gain even modest attention through Google's search engines, within hours, attract a swarm of very angry, non-eloquent users who spew short bursts of vitriolic vomit in the comment sections. This is done in an effort to discredit the piece as well as create a bandwagon effect for those people who look to others to find out what to think about complex topics. This would not be a problem if the comments were representative of Americans' thoughts, but it now seems apparent that, particularly with the issue of climate change and energy policy, that the comment sections of articles on these topics are being targeted by energy moguls using the military's persona management software. In other words, most strings of comments at the base of these articles are made by one person appearing to be up to as many as 70 different people, all armed with their own webpages, email, business front, and trappings of Joe average concerned citizen so as not to draw suspicion. In reality, this person is employed by someone in the energy industry to monitor the internet, seek out articles contrary to the industry position, and bomb them with negative vitriol.
The software that is used is capable of creating detailed backgrounds complete with webpage, email, and a genuine business front in order to make their 'expertise' seem more believable. The software even is able to make the created personas appear as though they are coming from any location in the world so as to prevent further suspicion, as well as the diversity of opposition. Some more sophisticated software is capable of commenting on live streams even when its operator is not present [3]; in essence, online comments, in some instances, has been automated.
These online robots have now been tied to online climate change deniers; [9] but the campaign against representative democracy does not stop there. The software has been used by conservative organizations to target labor unions, progressive organizations, journalists, and progressive bloggers. [4] The scene in Wisconsin that has spread across the country is indicative of of this trend; a relatively small group of people seized power under the guise that they were the majority, and when they tried to implement their ideas, they met stiff resistance from the actual majority. [18]
So, where did this information come from; how was it exposed that energy billionaires like the Kochs were paying for military software to be used against American citizens? This part of the story is actually quite interesting. A company named HBGary Federal, a U.S. military contractor, is in some pretty hot water after the cyber-activist group Anonymous hacked into the company's email stream and published the contents of some 60,000 emails online. [10] HBGary Federal makes persona management software, and part of the email cache that was published online revealed their connection not only to attempts to discredit WikiLeaks and sympathetic journalists to the cause, but also to organizations that were actively involved in influencing domestic political campaigns through the use of persona management software. [5] While HBGary Federal was targeted for its attack on WikiLeaks, other more interesting information was discovered in the email cache, and it is that information that brought the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's use of military persona management software to light. [11]
It doesn't appear that liberal cyber-activist groups like Anonymous are alone in their efforts to mine embarrassing or criminal behavior from their political adversaries in the hope of influencing public opinion. This cyber war between Republican and Democrat operatives shows no signs of cooling down before the 2012 election.
In light of the email dump, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has now been linked to HBGary in their efforts to snoop on families of liberal activists, creating and managing multiple personas online in an effort to influence public opinion, using internet-bots to troll social media scouring for information, and setting media traps baited with false information in an attempt to discredit liberal news sources. [7] The whole NPR fiasco and general attack on public television is part of this campaign. The powerful billionaires who created the Tea Party and who have now infiltrated American democracy in the hope of influencing energy legislation are now poised to not only influence it, but repeal existing protections and rewrite new policy that thrusts corporate interests even further ahead of basic human needs.
This effort to influence public opinion is as old as time, but the use of automated computer software to deliberately mislead American people is straight out of a science fiction novel. Its use by conservative organizations in mainstream politics today, however, has been confirmed, and astroturfing online is seemingly the new trend being employed by corporate interests in an effort to influence online 'discussions'. So, reader beware, those comment threads aren't what they seem. [8]
The emails that were stolen and published online showed that HBGary Federal is involved in creating software that would allow its users to assume multiple identities online, formerly for military use solely (that's no secret); but through Anonymous' attempt to expose HBGary Federal's effort to discredit the website WikiLeaks, evidence was uncovered that shows that HBGary Federal stepped over the line of legality by arming the U.S. Chamber of Commerce with military-grade psychological weaponry to be used against American citizens. [19] What that means for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and their plan to dismantle the Clean Air Act as well as the EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gases is left to be seen. It was Bank of America that contracted HBGary Federal to discredit WikiLeaks over concerns regarding WikiLeaks' next dump which was rumored to be about shady dealings during the financial crash. Now, Congress is being asked to investigate the matter, but a Republican controlled House might not see through to the importance of investigating this matter fully right now. [13]
Cyber-warfare for the hearts and minds of Americans, it seems, is what American democracy has come down to. Some could make the argument that American democracy was usurped by capitalism's marketing principles a long time ago and only perfected in the modern age under Presidents Reagan and Clinton. Whatever the trend, it appears as though the debate going on surrounding unions, energy, climate change, and healthcare is all fabricated; there is no debate. Americans support Unions, they want energy reform, they know that climate change is happening and is linked to human emissions, and they want universal healthcare; the 'debate' is being manufactured by a relatively few bunch of people amplifying their voices using computer software that was designed to be used against America's enemies in the Middle East.
The plan to turn democracy into a permanent marketing campaign has been around for some time now, some say tracing its roots back to Sigmund Freud's breakthrough ideas. We are all programmable. Freud talked about inner desires in humanity's psyche. It used to be the television that was used in democracies to program the inner desires of the masses; it appears that the internet has now taken the baton from the television as democracy's deliverer of propaganda.
