Today @dfrlab.bsky.social published an investigation into REST, a newly launched “media outlet” targeting Moldova ahead of its elxn. Our forensic analysis shows REST’s infrastructure and workflow is linked to milblogger channel Rybar, whose creator is sanctioned by the EU dfrlab.org/2025/09/23/s...

HUGE HUGE NEWS FROM EGYPT!! Egyptian President Sisi has issued a presidential pardon for activist and blogger Alaa Abdel Fattah.

I can't count the number of times I've cited this tweet to people.

Nav Pillay: "The Genocide Convention was born out of humanitys darkest chapters. Today we witness in real time how the promise of never again is broken and tested in the eyes of the world. The ongoing genocide in Gaza is a moral outrage and a legal emergency"

"Israel has committed genocide in the Gaza Strip, UN Commission finds" The UN joins other experts including the International Association of Genocide Scholars, Holocaust historians, and multitudes of lawyers in concluding this is genocide. www.ohchr.org/en/press-rel...

Scoop: Status has obtained the termination letter The Washington Post sent to @karenattiah.bsky.social, in which it informed her that she was being fired for social media posts "about white men." Details in @status.news: www.status.news/p/karen-atti...

What a news day. Frantically scrambling between news on the Arab Summit, the Kirk aftermath, and Canadian parliament reopening.

Qatar Emir opening today’s Arab Summit: “Have you ever heard of such an aggression? A state that is party to the negotiations & yet aggresses the venue where the negotiations take place….if you wish to insist on the liberation of hostages, why then do they assassinate all the negotiators?”

Some personal news: I've been fired from the Washington Post in the aftermath of the Charlie Kirk shooting. Thread incoming. substack.com/@karenattiah...

An attempt to ban social media in Nepal ended this week in violent protest with the PM ousted, Parliament in flames & soldiers on the streets. Now, the very technology the government tried to outlaw is being harnessed to help select the country’s next leader. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/11/w...

I saw The Voice of Hind Rajab tonight at TIFF. A devastating film, told in a deeply impactful way. It uses the real audio of Hind throughout and transitions from a “fictional” drama to a documentary. The entire theatre was heavily sobbing. And then everyone exited the room in palpable silence.

Just to be blunt, if you want Wired and 404 and The Verge to employ reporters who understand the memes on bullet casings and can connect them to gaming culture while having the legal and support resources to deal with waves of harassment when we do it… you have to subscribe and pay for the work

A long analysis on the future of UAE-Israel relations (and, more broadly, on UAE & GCC relations with the US) in light of Israel’s attack in Doha yesterday: 🧵⬇️

Reports of an attack, allegedly by a drone, on a vessel in the Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF), while anchored outside the port of Sidi Bou Said in Tunisia. The below video shows the moment of the incident. Keep it in mind when you read the next post. www.instagram.com/reel/DOXaR_M...

Just finished Small Boat by Vincent Delacroix. An incredible read about the collective vs individual burden of responsibility to confront pervasive injustices. It evoked similar themes to Hannah Arendt’s Eichmann in Jerusalem.

Posting through it - foreign policy edition

RCMP raided a cult compound in Saskatchewan belonging to a QAnon offshoot turned sovereign citizen movement www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

My story on the safeguards OpenAI plans to add for teens and other users who appear to be in distress. It includes parental controls which its developer community has been requesting since Jan 2024 and routing "sensitive" prompts to GPT-5 thinking. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/02/t...

Great story by my colleagues on the constant political realignment of Grok, the generative AI chatbot over on the other site. This change to Grok’s answer about the greatest threat to Western civilization is particularly ironic/meta. Gift link: www.nytimes.com/2025/09/02/t...

“The world's leading genocide scholars' association has passed a resolution saying that the legal criteria have been met to establish Israel is committing genocide in Gaza” www.reuters.com/world/middle...

The Guardian has today printed the names, and where possible, images, of all the media workers killed in Gaza, as part of an international day of action involving more than 150 media organisations. www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

“When The Logic created briefings using the same steps [the Minister] described, however, the results misled about a core feature of the bill twice in three tries.” thelogic.co/news/evan-so...

Canada announces sanctions against individuals and entities supporting Russia’s malign interference activities in Moldova. The move comes ahead of Moldova's Sept 28 parliamentary elections. www.canada.ca/en/global-af...

“We are outraged that independent journalists were among the victims of this strike on the hospital, a location that is protected under international law. These journalists were present in their professional capacity, doing critical work bearing witness.”

One of Syria’s most aggressive disinformation campaigns followed the Sweida violence. In this piece, I try to cut through the noise to separate real local grievances from the louder, destructive foreign propaganda. In @newlinesmag.bsky.social newlinesmag.com/argument/how...

New report from DFRLab & OpenMinds Digital occupation: Pro-Russian bot networks target Ukraine’s occupied territories on Telegram to cultivate the appearance of local consensus in favor of occupation and Russian administrative control. www.atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-res...

This fresh horror appears to be true. www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/gen... Bangkok Post - US visa applicants must make social media accounts public

Qatar MOD says it intercepted the missile attack. No deaths or injuries.

Bahrain MOI confirmed warning sirens were activated across the country, as Iran threatens retaliatory attacks in the region. "Citizens and residents are urged to remain calm and head to the nearest safe place." x.com/moi_bahrain/...

I have nothing profound to say. War is always a calamity.

Reports circulating that the UAE has closed its airspace, according to flight radar data. No official announcement yet. www.flightradar24.com/multiview/3a...

This guy in Missouri saw the strike package as it headed out of Whiteman AFB and tweeted it 24 hrs ago

"I am pleased to announce @Osint613 as my new Director of National Intelligence."

According to WSJ reporting, the United States informed Iran about the strikes in advance. Can only assume the decision to do so was made after the decoy plan was put into action.

Satellite images show signs of US bunker-buster bomb strikes on Fordow nuclear site.

For the first time, social media overtakes TV as Americans’ top news source

A deepfake video of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney went viral on TikTok and X. Despite being labeled, fact-checked, and eventually removed, the claims in the video continued to be amplified, illustrating how AI-generated disinformation persists. dfrlab.org/2025/06/19/d... @dfrlab.bsky.social

G7 leaders condemned transnational repression, warning that authoritarian regimes are increasingly using digital tools to surveil, harass, and silence dissidents abroad. The statement outlines countermeasures to defend against TNR. www.pm.gc.ca/en/news/stat...

WhatsApp's cofounder in 2012: “Remember, when advertising is involved *you the user* are the product." Meta this week: We're putting ads in WhatsApp. I wrote about the company's move to finally monetize one of the world's largest social networks: www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

Boosting the signal as Gaza enters its fourth day of a worsening communications blackout. #ReconnectGaza.

The nature of the attack also seems to cross new lines. Israel killed IRGC generals in previous rounds but targeted them outside Iran. Assassination of nuclear scientists is also not new but previously was done without attribution. No more shadow war—this is Israel-Iran conflict in full daylight.

Hong Kong's annual vigils for the Tiananmen victims used to attract 100,000+. Now the government has banned all remembrance activities & arrested anyone trying to commemorate June 4. Even a lamppost labelled 8964 had to be relabelled. Utterly Orwellian. www.hrw.org/news/2025/06...

NEW: Banned, yet broadcasting: Sanctioned Belarusian state media influencing the Polish elections dfrlab.org/2025/05/29/b...

Today, we received notice that our team’s last remaining NSF grant was terminated. For the first time since 2009, when I received an NSF Fellowship for Graduate Research, I have no active NSF grants.

NEW from the DFRLab: Online network with French ties promotes election interference claims in Romania dfrlab.org/2025/05/23/o...

"fully operational mobile McDonald’s unit" is a phrase that makes me feel like maybe i've passed away and all the news i read is all just the final neurons in my brain racing around making haphazard connections in the moments before darkness

Trump says U.S. will remove all sanctions on Syria. www.reuters.com/world/trump-...

Mohammed al Bardawil, a young witness to the attack on medics who we interviewed in Gaza, was killed at the weekend when an Israeli gunboat fired on Rafah beach. His father Saeed asked our colleague Bilal Shbair today for a photo of them together when Bilal interviewed them.