Twitter Whistleblower Surfaces Presenting Challenge for U.S. Surveillance State, Enter CNN and The Washington Post part 1 of 3
August 23, 2022 | sundance
The background story behind Jack’s Magic Coffee Shop takes an interesting twist today, as a whistleblower deep inside the Twitter technology side of the platform begins to outline what CNN calls, “a threat to its own users’ personal information, to company shareholders, to national security, and to democracy.”
This discussion is where it becomes critical to remember the nature of stakeholders in media.
CNN is the national media firm protecting the interests of the U.S. State Dept. The Washington Post is the national media firm protecting the interests of the U.S. intelligence apparatus. The latest Twitter whistleblower information originates in,.. wait for it… “an explosive whistleblower disclosure obtained exclusively by CNN and The Washington Post.”
The whistleblower is a former technology expert who came from within the research farm of DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Peiter “Mudge” Zatko, is a well-known cybersecurity expert who left government work, entered the public world, and eventually became the head of Twitter security, reporting directly to the CEO.
Peiter “Mudge” Zatko is now saying the background technology of Twitter is vulnerable to manipulation. I’m not going to go into the granules of what Mudge is outlining, instead I prefer to focus on the bigger picture, a scenario we have been outlining for quite a while that could, emphasize could, become very explosive, especially considering the legal challenges between the social media platform and Elon Musk.
The nub of the bigger story is essentially that the database of Twitter, and likely other social media platforms, is integrated with the U.S. intelligence system. The database of Twitter is not necessarily vulnerable to hacking by outside entities, although that is the framework used by media reporting this whistleblower issue.
The bigger risk to the surveillance state is discovery that Twitter and the U.S. intelligence community are in a public-private partnership. The Dept of Homeland Security has access by design, not flaw. How the stakeholder media are reporting on the issue shows the nature of the risk, (emphasis mine):
[…] The scathing disclosure, which totals around 200 pages, including supporting exhibits — was sent last month to a number of US government agencies and congressional committees, including the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice. The existence and details of the disclosure have not previously been reported. CNN obtained a copy of the disclosure from a senior Democratic aide on Capitol Hill. The SEC, DOJ and FTC declined to comment; the Senate Intelligence Committee, which received a copy of the report, is taking the disclosure seriously and is setting a meeting to discuss the allegations, according to Rachel Cohen, a committee spokesperson. (link)
How would it damage the U.S. government if previous claims about the Chinese government having access to all user data on TikTok, are shown to be exactly identical to the U.S. government having access to all user data on Twitter?
Let that question settle in for a few moments, because that is exactly what I have been alleging since, well, 2011, when the U.S. State Dept first collaborated with Twitter in a joint public-private partnership to use the platform as a communication tool exploiting the Arab Spring uprising in Egypt, Libya and beyond.
The issue of Jack’s Magic Coffee Shop is an issue of financial viability. The business model of Twitter just doesn’t exist as a free social media discussion platform while running the ultra-expensive data processing system needed for millions of simultaneous users. A global chat that requires exponential database responses as an outcome of simultaneous users is just ridiculously expensive. {Go Deep} However, if the computing system and massive database were being subsidized by the U.S. government, then the viability of the ‘free coffee‘ business model makes sense.
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/blog/2022/08/23/twitter-whistleblower-surfaces-presenting-challenge-for-u-s-surveillance-state-enter-cnn-and-the-washington-post/