Olives @olives@qoto.org
Software Engineer. Psy / Tech / Sex Science Enthusiast. Controversial?
Free Expression. Human rights / Civil Liberties. Anime. Liberal.
Joined May 2023
Also, the "SEO firm", uh, we have no real way to measure this, uh, our friends over at the SEO firm reckon it might be in this region. But, putting it forward as if it is some sort of hard data. Good grief.
It was very "there are bad people doing bad things somewhere on the Internet", then they tried to drum it up, and it just blew up in their faces when they tried to cherry-pick tiny numbers as "evidence" of it being some big bad thing.
It's one of those crud reports where someone pulls some superficial bits of information over some, what appears to be a rare phenomena, then someone else uses it to try to manufacture a panic, but even the language there seems over-blown ("at scale", scale, what scale).
Blowing up a panic over every random spammer or irrelevant site is silly.
And I think what was so stunning, was just how weak their arguments were, and particularly, what points they focused on.
Also, a significant amount of site traffic on the open web comes from bots, that would be one to consider with actual traffic data (which appears to be absent here).
https://public-assets.graphika.com/reports/graphika-report-a-revealing-picture.pdf This "report" is a mess. It tries to suggest criminals are oper...
https://public-assets.graphika.com/reports/graphika-report-a-revealing-picture.pdf
This "report" is a mess.
It tries to suggest criminals are operating at scale but all the evidence presented suggests it is a very small scale operation (and data from elsewhere shows that it is one which is being actively tackled, albeit at times with inappropriate tools with collateral consequences).
It briefly references a gossipy and very likely misleading news article which is actually irrelevant to this particular issue.
It tries to present "thousands of posts" as evidence of an "active website", except a "discussion forum" on the brink of death might have similar numbers, and it's not unusual for individual users (on inactive and non-abusive) websites to have thousands of posts apiece (particularly, the "Admin" account). It's even possible for an admin to pay people to create posts to make their own website appear more appealing to prospective users than competing sites.
And that is in the case of a single site, this report appears to reference as many as a dozen or more, likely further diluting their activity.
It references an "SEO firm" (of questionable repute) as a source of "traffic data". The only issue is that this SEO firm, which specializes in providing dirt on competitors, does not have access to site traffic data. They can only provide estimates.
In any case, even in the case of some genuine activity, this is still very weak material to use for trumped up AI scare pieces.
https://www.refused-classification.com/censorship-timelines/game-iarc/ The horror game "STAR" got flagged again. Probably a new build.
https://www.refused-classification.com/censorship-timelines/game-iarc/ Unfortunately, there is a lot of spam in here now from Fortnite (because someone decided to adopt IARC for something it's not intended for).
Looks like the game "ミマモロール！"(1) is being censored by Australia(2), probably because the system was built by freakin puritans (who worry about things which don't matter(3,4)).
As always, you can write to reps at the territory, state, and federal levels (5) to oppose any and all censorship.
1 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.psycho02.mimamo
2 https://www.refused-classification.com/censorship-timelines/game-iarc/
3 https://qoto.org/@olives/111516011246609826
"Following several high-profile data breaches in the past year, the federal government will review laws requiring companies to retain data as part of its new cyber security strategy.
Released on Wednesday, the 2023-30 strategy notes that data is increasingly used for ransom attacks and as a tool for coersion.
“Mishandling of sensitive and critical datasets can cause grave damage to Australia’s national interests,” it says. “Technological advancements have enabled malicious actors to develop vast data profiles on businesses, individuals and officials for intelligence gathering and commercial purposes.”"
"The strategy points out that businesses have voiced concerns that they are required to store substantial amounts of data for excessive periods of time, making them potentially high-value targets for hacking.
This was something raised in the wake of the Optus and Medibank data breaches, where tens of millions of customer records dating back years were exposed, with some then ending up on the dark web."
"Medical testing company Australian Clinical Labs had “serious and systemic failures” that resulted in a cyber-attack that led to more than 200,000 customer health records and credit card details being published on the dark web, the Australian information commissioner has alleged.
In October last year, in the midst of the Medibank and Optus cyber-attacks, Medlab’s parent company, ACL, confirmed it had been the victim of a cyber-attack eight months earlier in February.
The hacker group responsible – known as Quantum – was able to exfiltrate 86GB worth of data, including customer passport information, health information, and credit card details including number, expiry date and CCV."
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/nov/29/australian-clinical-labs-hack-quantum-cyber-attack-oaic By the way, this is the country which a couple of Ylva's "experts" (cops) were from. #chatcontrol
We thought Superman was invincible but then he bought a smartphone and was overcome by the foul mouth of Trollman.
https://qoto.org/@olives/111191543236620885
While I make a drug war reference here, there also seems to be a crossover between people who support mass surveillance... And people who are fond of the War on Drugs...
Funny how there is someone who just sits there reading every bit of criticism against chat control (and it just goes on and on forever).
For context, it's a *country specific* number in a country with like 70 million people (which makes it even worse).
Also, regardless of what someone thinks of that practice of minors sexting with each other, having all these personal images being collected in mass and stored in databases to be viewed by unknown persons (and passed around among various cop agencies) is quite disturbing (and far less secure than if it were not).
The police are also not really the appropriate party to be dealing with such matters. #chatcontrol
"with someone they knew offline said it was with a boyfriend or girlfriend"
"it's also not clear that data actually supports that"
For instance, you could imagine the case of a scanning company butting into such relationships more intrusively.
Also, it could well be higher than that, as someone could specifically use an app that is safer for something like that (i.e. more secure). #chatcontrol
By the way, Thorn put out a statement saying this:
"Norms in relationships are changing."
"More than two in three minors (69%) who have shared their own "Self Generated Child Sexual Abuse Material" with someone they knew offline said it was with a boyfriend or girlfriend, up from just over half (54%) in 2021."
First off, Thorn is hardly what I'd call a reliable source (it's also not clear that data actually supports that).
Secondly, even here, they're incapable of not inserting emotionally manipulative nonsense terms. Is it appropriate or acceptable? Well, there is a question to be had about that. Maybe. But, pretending it is the same as "abuse" is absurd.
They know exactly what they're doing. They do it deliberately.
https://www.techdirt.com/2023/12/08/meta-finally-launches-default-end-to-end-encryption-in-messenger/ Commentary on FB Messenger adopting end-to-end encryption by default.
"there are millions of offenders in a few forums"
Actually, this "evil dark web" statistic is false. That is the number of accounts. It is established in news articles that people who use these sites create an account every time they access it.
One article estimated the actual number of people to be around ten thousand, although it's unclear whether that is wholly accurate.
I'd also be wary of determining the behavior of every user (i.e. to try to argue greater immorality) based on users who "speak". Remember, the 1% rule: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule
That said, it's irrelevant what some criminals do, when so many people also use these tools for legitimate purposes.
Software Engineer. Psy / Tech / Sex Science Enthusiast. Controversial?
Free Expression. Human rights / Civil Liberties. Anime. Liberal.
Joined May 2023
