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John Lemke

Snowden leak examines gaming as a terrorist propaganda and training tool | Ars Technica - 0 views

arstechnica.com/...t-propaganda-and-training-tool

2013 leak gaming terrorist propaganda training tool ars

shared by John Lemke on 09 Dec 13 - No Cached
  • But those leaked documents also include an in-depth report on the potential for games to be used as recruitment, training, and propaganda tools by extremist organizations.
  • Even if, as the report says, "the line between the ‘virtual’ world and the ‘real’ world is blurring, and to some users may be non-existent," most of the game-related terrorist training and planning scenarios laid out here seem a lot less likely than plain old non-game-related options. In any case, the leak of this report and the scenarios it outlines show that the security apparatus is interested in online games as more than just a place to spy on potential enemy communications.
John Lemke

Ain't No Science Fiction, Suspended Animation Is FDA Approved and Heading To Clinical T... - 0 views

singularityhub.com/...and-heading-to-clinical-trials

2012 science clinical trials fda medicine hypothermia suspended animation tauma surgery cooling

shared by John Lemke on 26 Sep 12 - No Cached
  • The Food and Drug Administration has already approved his technique for human trials, and he has secured funding from the Army to conduct the feasibility phase. Dr. Rhee is currently lobbying for funds to conduct a full trial. If he’s successful human trials could begin as early as next year.
  • What Dr. Rhee hopes to test on humans is a method he worked out for the past couple decades on pigs. Patients would be injected with a cold fluid to induce severe hypothermia. Clinically hypothermia is characterized by the drop of a person’s body temperature from its normal 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit (37 degrees Celcius) to lower than 95 degrees (35 C). Below 95, the heart, nervous system and other organs begin to fail. The strict range is indicative of a metabolic system with strict temperature requirements for proper function (death waits only a few degrees the other way as well). Dr. Rhee’s method involves injecting patients with a cold fluid that would bring the body’s temperature down to 50 degrees Fahrenheit (10 C). Sounds chilling, but when he induced the extreme hypothermia in pigs they came out just fine. Heart function, breathing, and brain function was completely normal.
  • Dr. Rhee is no stranger to high-stakes medicine. The native South Korean was trained at the Uniformed Services University Medical School in Bethesda, Maryland. Following a fellowship in trauma and critical care at the University of Washington’s Harborview Medical Center he served in the US Navy as director of the University of South California’s Navy Trauma Training Center at Los Angeles County. He was then sent to Afghanistan where he was one of the first surgeons at Camp Rhino. Later he started the first surgical unit at Ramadi, Iraq. His cool under fire was on display nationally as he performed surgery on US Representative Gabrielle Giffords after she was shot through the skull in the Tucson shootings this past January. His experience with induced hypothermia came into play the night of the shootings when Dr. Rhee removed part of the congresswoman’s skull. The wound had raised her body temperature and began “cooking the brain.” He used a device to cool Rep. Giffords’ skin.
John Lemke

Spy Babe Now Wants to Design Astronaut Outfits | Danger Room | Wired.com - 0 views

www.wired.com/...ts-to-design-astronaut-outfits

2011 writeabout spy espinoge security Russia AnnaChapman Chapman babe design Fashion

shared by John Lemke on 26 Feb 11 - No Cached
  • John Lemke on 26 Feb 11
     
    Is your national space program fashion-forward enough? Astronauts getting a little frumpy after the Cold War? Having trouble getting that space plane off the ground? Why not lift morale and brighten up the place with some fierce new uniforms designed by planet Earth's most infamous ex-spy? Yes, Russia's famously outed sleeper agent Anna Chapman is back in yet another installment of her merciless publicity tour. This time, she's looking to help the ground crew at Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center work it down the runway in style. Frilly epaulets for all! "Chapman told me that she intends to participate in designing clothing for the Khrunichev [Space] Center, in what capacity, designer or financially, she did not specify," the Gagarin Astronaut Training Center's top astronaut told Russian state media today.
John Lemke

How Covert Agents Infiltrate the Internet to Manipulate, Deceive, and Destroy Reputatio... - 0 views

firstlook.org/...jtrig-manipulation

NSA GCHQ 2014 misinformation psyops surveillance spying espinoge yourrights indienationnews law

shared by John Lemke on 25 Feb 14 - No Cached
  • “The Art of Deception: Training for Online Covert Operations.”
  • Among the core self-identified purposes of JTRIG are two tactics: (1) to inject all sorts of false material onto the internet in order to destroy the reputation of its targets; and (2) to use social sciences and other techniques to manipulate online discourse and activism to generate outcomes it considers desirable. To see how extremist these programs are, just consider the tactics they boast of using to achieve those ends: “false flag operations” (posting material to the internet and falsely attributing it to someone else), fake victim blog posts (pretending to be a victim of the individual whose reputation they want to destroy), and posting “negative information” on various forums. 
  • Critically, the “targets” for this deceit and reputation-destruction extend far beyond the customary roster of normal spycraft: hostile nations and their leaders, military agencies, and intelligence services. In fact, the discussion of many of these techniques occurs in the context of using them in lieu of “traditional law enforcement” against people suspected (but not charged or convicted) of ordinary crimes or, more broadly still, “hacktivism”, meaning those who use online protest activity for political ends. The title page of one of these documents reflects the agency’s own awareness that it is “pushing the boundaries” by using “cyber offensive” techniques against people who have nothing to do with terrorism or national security threats, and indeed, centrally involves law enforcement agents who investigate ordinary crimes:
    • John Lemke
      John Lemke on 25 Feb 14
       
      Wow, how is not changing pictures and creating false victims not identity theft and conspiracy?  
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • it is not difficult to see how dangerous it is to have secret government agencies being able to target any individuals they want – who have never been charged with, let alone convicted of, any crimes – with these sorts of online, deception-based tactics of reputation destruction and disruption.
    • John Lemke
      John Lemke on 25 Feb 14
       
      Not only are you now guilty until proven innocent but, if you are guilty enough, we shall create a situation so that you are.
  • Government plans to monitor and influence internet communications, and covertly infiltrate online communities in order to sow dissension and disseminate false information, have long been the source of speculation. Harvard Law Professor Cass Sunstein, a close Obama adviser and the White House’s former head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, wrote a controversial paper in 2008 proposing that the US government employ teams of covert agents and pseudo-”independent” advocates to “cognitively infiltrate” online groups and websites, as well as other activist groups. Sunstein also proposed sending covert agents into “chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups” which spread what he views as false and damaging “conspiracy theories” about the government. Ironically, the very same Sunstein was recently named by Obama to serve as a member of the NSA review panel created by the White House, one that – while disputing key NSA claims – proceeded to propose many cosmetic reforms to the agency’s powers (most of which were ignored by the President who appointed them).
    • John Lemke
      John Lemke on 25 Feb 14
       
      So one of the guys who advocates this and approves of it, gets to be on the NSA review committee?  Isn't that like Ted Kennedy on the Ethics Review Committee or the Warren Commission?
  • Whatever else is true, no government should be able to engage in these tactics: what justification is there for having government agencies target people – who have been charged with no crime – for reputation-destruction, infiltrate online political communities, and develop techniques for manipulating online discourse? But to allow those actions with no public knowledge or accountability is particularly unjustifiable.
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