Alex Jones is going to war with Silicon Valley. As one of the internet's most controversial personalities, making outlandish claims and spreading conspiracy theories through his Infowars website and broadcast has made Jones a household name in political circles. Initially, it was for his baseless accusation that 9/11 was an inside job. But in the past several years, he's claimed survivors of a mass shooting at a Parkland, Florida, high school were "crisis actors." (False.) He's claimed that the mass shooting of 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary was a hoax. (False.) And he's claimed Hillary Clinton was involved in a child sex trafficking ring. (False.) Critics have cried foul, saying Jones' particular brand of unproven accusations whip his fans into a frenzy, after which they harass, threaten and intimidate. In one extreme case, the parents of a Sandy Hook Elementary shooting victim told The New York Times they receive so many death threats and harassing messages … [Read more...] about Alex Jones and Infowars test the limit of free speech on the internet
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Fascism on the rise: Portland extremists reveal themselves
[Note from Vanguard Editor-in-Chief, Colleen Leary]: In recent years, droves of new residents have flocked to Portland, many under the guise of a Portlandia-branded utopian liberal oasis: an easy-going city open to people of all ages, shapes, sizes, persuasions, colors and backgrounds. This perception is, quite simply, false. Recent public displays of hate, racism, white pride and violence in the name of nationalism have solicited public response of shock and dismay. Surely this couldn’t be happening in our happy, safe and inclusive Portland. In reality, this is nothing new to Portland, a city whose history has been mired in racism and discrimination from day one. In 1859, the state of Oregon established itself as white-only, an exclusion that officially ended in 1922. At the time, the state touted the largest per capita membership of the Ku Klux Klan. In 1988, three racist skinheads attacked a 27-year-old Ethiopian named Mulugeta Seraw. One skinhead bludgeoned him to death. … [Read more...] about Fascism on the rise: Portland extremists reveal themselves
DARPA: Nobody’s safe on the Internet
The following script is from "DARPA Dan" which aired on 60 Minutes Feb. 8, 2015. Lesley Stahl is the correspondent. Shachar Bar-On, producer. The recent cyber invasions of Sony studios and military Twitter feeds highlight how hacking has morphed from a commercial nuisance to a matter of national security. The man the Department of Defense has put in charge of inventing technology to fight this new Internet war is Dan Kaufman. He heads the software innovation division of DARPA - the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, tasked with maintaining our military technological superiority. It makes sense that DARPA is working on this: after all, it invented the Internet. But Kaufman is an unexpected choice: he's not a general or a scientist or engineer. He's a videogamer. Call him DARPA Dan. And he says it's only right that the agency that brought us the Internet find a way to secure it. Lesley Stahl: How common are attacks, cyberattacks, against the U.S. military? Dan Kaufman: … [Read more...] about DARPA: Nobody’s safe on the Internet
CBS News Logo How authorities infiltrate the Internet underworld
On July 15, law enforcement authorities from 20 countries arrested more than two dozen suspects allegedly associated with Darkode, an online forum for malicious hacking. For agencies tasked with cracking down on the Internet’s underworld, it was a rare victory, according to experts. The Darkode bust, they said, shows that you don’t have to scour the deep web -- a part of the Internet that isn’t indexed by search engines -- to find illegal products. The Internet is home to hundreds of illicit markets, where products ranging from hacking tools and codes to guns and drugs can be purchased with relative anonymity. Nevertheless, infiltrating and busting illicit markets in cyberspace remains extremely difficult for investigators. The best markets can’t be found with a simple Google search, but the first step is to find the ones that can, according to Tom Holt, a professor at Michigan State University who researches illicit data markets. “There are multiple … [Read more...] about CBS News Logo How authorities infiltrate the Internet underworld
CBS News Logo Fact check: Is U.S. giving away the internet?
WASHINGTON Donald Trump’s campaign says a government plan to give up managing key operations of the internet poses a threat of outside censorship of online information. But such an outcome is highly unlikely. The upcoming Oct. 1 transition, which will result in no immediate discernible change for internet users, is the result of planning that started under President Bill Clinton in 1998 and continued largely unopposed during the presidencies of George W. Bush and Barack Obama. The U.S. government’s role has diminished as the behind-the-scenes, technical administration has increasingly been performed by a California-based nonprofit organization that coordinates with private experts around the world. An office within the Commerce Department, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, still has limited oversight over the system of internet addresses. But day-to-day management long ago was ceded to the Internet Corporation for Assigned … [Read more...] about CBS News Logo Fact check: Is U.S. giving away the internet?