Twitter helping US authorities with BLM mass surveillance
Twitter is in the news for all the wrong reasons at the moment. But beyond the hack of the accounts of the great and the good, behind the scenes the microblogging site has been helping US law enforcement to track and surveil BLM protests.
Dataminr, a company that works closely with the social media platform has been using its privileged access to Twitter realtime data to inform law enforcement agencies about the latest posts of people they identify as BLM demonstrators and activists.
Both Twitter and Dataminr have previously made statements that neither would take part or assist in domestic surveillance, but according to a report by The Intercept this is clearly not the case.
Dataminr’s core business is aimed at providing corporations with a heads up on looming reputational risk issues by scanning social media to pick up signals.
Excerpt from The Intercept:
Dataminr’s Black Lives Matter protest surveillance included persistent monitoring of social media to tip off police to the locations and activities of protests, developments within specific rallies, as well as instances of alleged “looting” and other property damage. According to the source with direct knowledge of Dataminr’s protest monitoring, the company and Twitter’s past claims that they don’t condone or enable surveillance are “bullshit,” relying on a deliberately narrowed definition. “It’s true Dataminr doesn’t specifically track protesters and activists individually, but at the request of the police they are tracking protests, and therefore protesters,” this source explained.
The Intercept
Thanks Twitter: US mass surveillance… just like China?
In another report from The Intercept, journalists have uncovered how the police have ignored the real and present threat of right-wing terrorism around the BLM protests in the US, and instead preferred to pursue fictitious claims, trumpeted by Trump and others, about antifa.
The so-called Blueleaks hack has exposed the details of 700,000 cops in the US.
After the hack, Twitter shutdown the DDoSecrets site that had disseminated information about the Blueleaks hack. The Reddit sub – r/blueleaks has also been banned.
The leaked data dates from 2007 to June 14, 2020, so include much of the protests that took place following the murder of George Floyd by police.
Much of the information in the leaks has come from so-called Fusion centres set up post 9/11 with the purpose of enabling different state and Federal law enforcement agencies to share information.
Some of the hacked websites also included those where law enforcement collaborates with corporations in various guises, such as the Energy Security Council.
Many hacked sites also included data from the high-intensity drug trafficking area program (HIDTA).
And finally another bunch of websites were membership-only police officer associations of one type or another.
Of particular interest were the many instances of SAR reports uncovered – Suspicious Activity Reports.
One such SAR concerned a student seeking pro bono legal aid assistance from a law firm.
A racist lawyer saw it and contacted law enforcement.
“PLEASE SEE THE ATTACHED SOLICITATION I RECEIVED FROM AN ANTIFA TERRORIST WANTING MY HELP TO BAIL HER AND HER FRIENDS OUT OF JAIL, IF ARRESTED FOR RIOTING,” he typed into an unhinged letter, in all-caps, that he mailed to the Marin County District Attorney’s office, just north of San Francisco.
He explained that he was remaining anonymous because he “CANNOT RISK THIS PIECE OF SHIT ANTIFA […] FILING A BAR COMPLAINT AGAINST ME,” and warned that “THE SAN FRANCISCO PUBLIC DEFENDERS WILL VIGOROUSLY DEFEND THESE TERRORISTS.” He ended his letter, “HAPPY HUNTING.”
Instead of throwing the lawyer’s communication in the garbage, it was uploaded to the local fusion centre as useful intelligence.
This is one example of an estimated 1,200 commmunity-submitted SARs.
Other SARs were similarly racist.
Again, the full story at The Intercept.
Please consider donating to The Intercept so they keep up with their brilliant investigative journalism.
Jen Reid statue replaces Edward Colson in daring dawn Bristol BLM action
Update: Thursday 16 July 2020 – Bristol City Council has removed the Jen Reid statue from the plinth and placed it in a museum to await collection by artist Marc Quinn
Catching the Bristol authorities totally unaware, a dawn action by BLM supporters has erected a stunning statue of Jen Reid, a BLM protester.
Jen was the protester who was photographed with raised fist on the empty plinth upon which once sat slave trader Edward Colston.
Two lorries and 10 people were involvement in the carefully planned erection of the Jen Reid statue.
The scuplture is by artist Marc Quinn.
Jen Reid told the Guardian, just before the statues were readied to depart the scene: “That’s pretty fucking ballsy, that it is.”
Bristol has a vibrant radical artist scene and the action at 5am in the morning has combined with the radical roots of the city, from the Bus boycott in 1963 to the St Pauls riot of 1981.
An estimated 20,000 mostly white Bristolians took part in the protest that toppled Colston on 7 June 2020.
Bristol is the home town of elusive radical street artist Banksy.
The Jen Reid statue will no doubt rile the right-wing and racists everywhere who claim that removing the Colston statue was an affront to history.
In reality the throwing of Colston into the dock was the perfect location for the monstrous human rights abuser, kidnapper and murderer.
Commuters were gathering around the statue this morning to discuss its import.
“It is incredible seeing it,” said the daughter of Reid, Leila Reid.
Artist Quinn said: “Jen created the sculpture when she stood on the plinth and rasied her arm in the air. Now we’ve crystalised it.”
He continued: “It look like it has always been here.”
Jen Reid video: she told friends “you’re going to see a lot more of me”
“I’m elated excited, I’m full of pride. I feel really really proud. I shed a tear. It’s all about keeping the conversation going… keeping black lives matter at the forefront and making history” – Jen Reid
All Black Lives UK London BLM protest – Sunday 19 July 2pm Marble Arch
NEXT LONDON PROTEST: SUNDAY 19TH JULY
Marble Arch, 2pm
The movement continues.
We will have speeches and spoken word performances at Marble Arch and Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens ?
#ABLUK #LDNBLM #BlackLivesMatter
Police abandon arrest in face of action by Sistah Space protesters
The police turned up at the protest to keep open vital women’s service Sistah Space.
As you can see in the video below by Charlotte Moore, the cops got more than they bargained for after an intervention by concerned citizens to stop an arrest of a woman protester.
Hackney Council is forcing the Women’s refuge service that provides a safe space for survivors of domestic violence to close. This protest aims to stop that.
But in the middle of the protest (Friday 10 July) the police attempted to arrest a protester.
A call went up from Sistah Space supporters: “Let her go!”
Police were surrounded and eventually forced to exit the scene.
Now that’s what we call community policing!
Please support Sistah Space by donating to their gofundme here.
Echoes of George Floyd murder in police killing of Frank Ogboru
Frank Ogboru died after being restrained by police in Calderwood Street Woolwich, London, on 26 September 2006.
Four police officers were on top of Frank, with one at least for some of the time with his knee forced down on his head, when he expired.
Frank Ogboru, a Nigerian businessman, was on a tourist visit to the UK when he met his death.
The full horror is coming to light after an Inquest found that the police had ignored Frank’s cries and he struggled for breath.
“You are killing me, I can’t breathe,” he pleas.
Speaking from Lagos, Mr Ogboru’s widow, Christy said at the time of the killing: “I am crushed. I put my faith in the British system to give me justice but it has failed me. Frank was not a criminal. He did not deserve to die in the street like an animal.”
The Crown Prosecution Service is now reopening the case. Channel Four News has the full story:
Photos: Tottenham BLM says end Section 60 stop and search and ban tasers now!
A hundred BLM protesters assembled outside the Tottenham police station for the third time in the past three weeks as they stepped up their campaign against stop and search and for the banning of the Taser.
Support was notably vocal from passing motorists, as the constant stream of police abuses caught on video adds to rising anger across London.
Thanks to Stand Up To Racism for organising.
A similar protest was held down the road at Hackney’s Stoke Newington police station later in the day
