Archive for the 'Dictatorship' Category
How the CIA Made Google
January 27th, 2015This is a really good one. Via: Medium: Google styles itself as a friendly, funky, user-friendly tech firm that rose to prominence through a combination of skill, luck, and genuine innovation. This is true. But it is a mere fragment of the story. In reality, Google is a smokescreen behind which lurks the US military-industrial […]
S&P Cuts Russia Credit Rating to ‘Junk’
January 27th, 2015“I’d seriously consider getting her and her money out of there ASAP. You wouldn’t want her to be in Putin-Land or holding Putin-Bucks if this thing gets any worse.” —Cryptogon, August 2014 Via: AFP: Standard and Poor’s stripped Russia of its investment-grade rating on Monday, cutting it to “junk” status with a warning of weak […]
DEA Runs Massive Surveillance Operation to Record Movement of Americans with License Plate Readers
January 27th, 2015Via: ACLU: The Drug Enforcement Administration has initiated a massive national license plate reader program with major civil liberties concerns but disclosed very few details, according to new DEA documents obtained by the ACLU through the Freedom of Information Act. The DEA is currently operating a National License Plate Recognition initiative that connects DEA license […]
Saudi King Abdullah Dies, New Ruler Is Salman
January 22nd, 2015Via: Reuters: Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah died early on Friday and his brother Salman became king, the royal court in the world’s top oil exporter and birthplace of Islam said in a statement carried by state television. King Salman has named his half-brother Muqrin as his crown prince and heir.
Russia’s Net Outflows Hit Their Highest Level Ever
January 18th, 2015Via: Business Insider: Net outflows by companies and banks reached $151.5 billion in 2014, more than two times as much as in 2013, according to the Russian Central Bank . The last time the level of outflows was this high was during the global financial crisis in 2008, when it reached $133.6 billion. The fourth […]
The Birth of D Weapons
January 17th, 2015Via: Spiegel: According to top secret documents from the archive of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden seen exclusively by SPIEGEL, they are planning for wars of the future in which the Internet will play a critical role, with the aim of being able to use the net to paralyze computer networks and, by doing so, potentially […]
The U.S. Has More Jails Than Colleges
January 13th, 2015Via: Washington Post: There were 2.3 million prisoners in the U.S. as of the 2010 Census. It’s often been remarked that our national incarceration rate of 707 adults per every 100,000 residents is the highest in the world, by a huge margin. We tend to focus less on where we’re putting all those people. But […]
Leaked Palantir Doc Reveals Uses, Specific Functions and Key Clients
January 12th, 2015Via: TechCrunch: Palantir’s data analysis solution targets three industries: government, the finance sector and legal research. Each of these industries must wrestle with massive sets of data. To do this, Palantir’s toolsets are aimed at massive data caches, allowing litigators and the police to make connections otherwise invisible. For example, a firm hired by the […]
Venezuela: Military Supervises Food Distribution
January 9th, 2015The stores are full, comrades. Just form orderly lines and do what the soldiers say. Via: Bloomberg: Shoppers thronged grocery stores across Caracas today as deepening shortages led the government to put Venezuela’s food distribution under military protection. Long lines, some stretching for blocks, formed outside grocery stores in the South American country’s capital as […]
China’s Elaborate and Absurd Internet Propaganda Machine
January 8th, 2015Seems like their learned their tricks from watching White House press conferences. Via: Quartz: “NOTICE: We request every internet commenter carry out the following task today,” begins an email from the supervisor. It’s just another day in the propaganda department of Zhanggong, a district in southeast China’s modestly sized city of Ganzhou. Employees and freelancers […]
