MIT Technology Review profiles @rondeibert.bsky.social, who understood that civil society needed digital defense long before just about anyone else and has been doing it ever since. www.technologyreview.com/2025/12/24/1...

I’ll just note that the US didn’t do this to China, which outright bans US social media websites

"There's basically an economy around disinformation now" Maybe now could be the right time to start asking politicians and your organisation's social teams why they're actively assisting monetised disinformation schemes by retaining their accounts at X and doing free volunteer work by posting there

“Report on that fact”. That’s all that needs to be said.

Just to be clear: if 'no one was ready' a lot of people fucked up, bc those of us who work on this laid out what was going to happen 8yrs ago. The twofold issue that 1)it's not just a tech problem, and 2) Big Tech allowed itself to be ref-worked into spinelessness. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/08/t...

OpenAI's Sora 2 ultrarealistic (but fake) AI videos used by Russian disinformation operations, who could have predicted it?!? www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-...

Get off X. If you’re there for the audience, you’re just damaging your own optics.

1/ Yesterday’s Q2-Q3 Adversarial Threat Report by Meta was interesting in many ways. For us @citizenlab.ca, it was a blast from the past. For the first time, Meta’s investigators attributed what in 2019 we had named Endless Mayfly - a relentless, sophisticated influence op targeting Iran’s enemies.

In 2019, we @citizenlab.ca published an investigation into a disinfo / influence operation we called "Endless Mayfly", and which we attributed at the time to an "Iran-aligned entity" citizenlab.ca/2019/05/burn... Now, Meta's latest adversarial threat report showing we were spot on 👇

We condemn the ongoing targeting of exiled #HongKong activist #CarmenLau, who has faced persistent transnational repression since fleeing her home four years ago. Most recently, her neighbours were sent fake, sexually explicit images of her: www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Textbook transnational repression targeting @carmenlau.bsky.social and once again, belittling *women* who bravely stand up to autocracy.

Can disinformation become sabotage? Yes. I posted about the Syrian Electronic Army yesterday: remember when they crashed the Dow Jones with a single tweet in 2013? Disrupting financial markets and rail infrastructure doesn’t differ in principle. Unrestrained AI use makes it only much easier now.

There goes “Th3 Pr0”, lead in one of the earliest online influence ops to catch the attention of the “West”. “Ahmad Al Agha, one of the purported leaders of the hacker group, Syrian Electronic Army, appeared in federal court last month after being pursued by the law enforcement for eleven years.”

It is good to see enforcement of the EU Digital Services Act against X. We need more principled democratic governance of tech platforms, and penalties for non-compliance 1) Elon Musk’s X Hit With $140 Million Fine in Europe www.nytimes.com/2025/12/05/t...

While "peace" negotiations continue, remember that Russia could simply stop the war at any time.

Press friends, please. Whenever you see a new report on [hundreds of] false news websites run by [foe], before typing that headline, ask: what’s their impact? I.e.: did they fail at attracting anyone like #PAPERWALL, for example? Make it clear. Their first goal may be to be amplified by *you*.

#TaiPo fire: Took 4 days to arrive here: Man arrested for sedition. HKFP understands is the student who made "4 demands" of the authorities: hongkongfp.com/2025/11/30/h... Beijing warns "anti-China disrupted" they'll face the "full force" of the security law: hongkongfp.com/2025/11/29/b...

“DARVO (an acronym for "Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender") is a reaction that perpetrators of wrongdoing may display in response to being held accountable for their behavior.”

Every single congressional Democrat needs to be out there, right now, insisting that Pete Hegseth resign right now and announcing that he will be held accountable for committing war crimes. If you do not demand accountability here and now, they will only become more emboldened.

What does this say about the role of disinformation in destroying justice and accountability?

For example: remember #JUICYJAM? The self-professed “businesswoman” who doxxed Thai protesters with information that only a government could have access to? How likely is it that such an innocent private user is regularly on a Japanese VPN despite using the Thai version of the Android X app?

Thanks @cyn-k.bsky.social.

Linking to these reports + threads below to make it easy. Researchers at @citizenlab.ca put so much work into these investigations & can be hard to keep up with each new one. Worth noting yet again that just because someone presents something as new, esp in tech, doesn't mean it is:

This article's focus on Trump and MAGA is inevitable, I guess, but this new facility is also opening up thousands of "sock puppet" troll accounts run by Rwanda's dictatorial regime to public scrutiny - finally. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

…as we @citizenlab.ca have shown time and time again. Just check our #PRISONBREAK, #JUICYJAM, #HKLEAKS, Endless Mayfly, and many more reports.

I give Catholic bishops a hard time often for all the obvious reasons, but this is beautiful and loving, and I'm deeply grateful to hear it. This can change hearts and save lives.

Just ask Italian neofascists about their misappropriation of Tolkien’s literature - which was written largely with the horrors of WWI (and was certainly not indifferent to WWII) in mind.

It was a pleasure to chat with Negar about PRISONBREAK. Read our report here: citizenlab.ca/2025/10/ai-e...

“Europe faces an existential choice: build genuine technological sovereignty now, or accept governance by platforms whose architects view democracy as an obsolete operating system.”

Everyone is talking about AI. It's obviously having a transformative impact across all sectors of society. So how should the Canadian government approach it? My interview with Yvonne Lau for the @financialpost.com financialpost.com/technology/c...

This entire keynote by @micahflee.com should be watched, but this excerpt, my friends - oh yes. micahflee.com/practical-de...

I thought we had agreed a few decades ago that Nazi propaganda was bad?

This great investigation by @jacksapoch.bsky.social is more evidence of the capability and willingness by the Israeli military to widely use sophisticated manipulations to advance communication objectives. What we showed last week with PRISONBREAK is a piece of a much bigger influence puzzle.

Imagine if Napster back then said something like “I just don’t know how you go around, asking everyone first. I just don’t see how that would work.”

1/ NEW REPORT: “We Say You Want a Revolution” - An AI-Enabled Influence Operation Aimed at Overthrowing the Iranian Regime. We call it PRISONBREAK. Keep reading to find out why. THREAD 🧵

This.

Some novel TTPs described here. “Another effective tool is sending “fake government orders”. There was (a fake government order) for public institutions to display rainbow flags and another one for schools to display LGBT informational posters at the beginning of the school year,” he pointed out.”

“Google said in a statement […] “On YouTube, as part of our proactive coverage for the 2025 Moldova elections, we have terminated more than 1,000 channels since June 2024 for being part of coordinated influence operations targeting Moldova.””

I’m sure it’s not news to anyone actually paying attention, but we should probably care more that a lot of “name-surname-5digits” accounts are spreading the hashtag #abandonNATO on X at the moment.

In the NL, two secondary schools were closed for a day for risk of violence after “footage of violent attacks between rival youth groups, including a video showing a boy being kicked in the head, and *AI-generated videos of school explosions*, reportedly circulated on social media”.

Regardless of what your politics are, this is a statement I can stand behind: [Utah Governor Spencer Cox said] "log off, turn off, touch grass, hug a family member, go out and do good in your community".

What struck the Gaza Aid Flotilla? After we published the story, the Tunisian Ministry of Interior issued a statement describing the incident “that took place yesterday” as a “premeditated attack” stating that an investigation had been launched.”

Allow me a breather after the two most stressful days of a stressful year so far. Total lunar eclipse, 7 September.

Forensic researchers @citizenlab.ca today confirmed FlexiSPY spyware was found on 2 Kenyan filmmakers' phones. Victims helped produce a documentary about youth uprisings in the increasingly autocratic country. Spyware was installed while phones were in police custody. therecord.media/researchers-...

i'm reminded of jimmy savile by all this stuff about epstein's famous friends. it was a very open secret what he was like, but the mainstream media kindly held off any serious investigations until after he died

And to @rondeibert.bsky.social ‘s point: “The Russians have flooded social media with fake posts, videos and entire websites that are created and spread on TikTok, Telegram, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube using increasingly effective AI tools.”

Great oped by @citizenlab.ca ‘s @rondeibert.bsky.social on AI + disinformation. Two quotes I feel especially close to: 1/ Social media & AI platforms have shut down open interfaces previously used by researchers, while becoming litigious toward critics & researchers, stifling independent watchdogs.

President Sergio Mattarella “speaking of a "new global corporatism" on the part of "new East India Companies" engaged in a project of colonial influence and exploitation, Mattarella spoke of a "neo-imperialist drive for domination, lethal for the future of humanity."

NEW: Mercenary spyware is coming to the US. ICE just quietly unsuspended their contract with spyware maker #Paragon. Remember them? Caught earlier this year being used to hack Italian journalists. This is bad, let's talk about how we got here 1/ jackpoulson.substack.com/p/exclusive-...