Aug 24, 2015 04:08 PM
How Mexican Twitter Bots Shut Down Dissent
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/how-mex...wn-dissent
EXCERPT: More than 75,000 automated Twitter accounts are being used in Mexico to combat protests and attack critics of the government, according to research presented by writer Erin Gallagher at the Chaos Communication Camp in Zehdenick, Germany earlier this month. [...] According to Gallagher’s research, Peñabots also target individual journalists and activists for smear campaigns, death threats, and other forms of harassment. The problem, she said, is that "social media is the new public square. Mexicans are relying on these networks to get their news out to the world and to communicate with each other... When these networks are manipulated, it is extremely damaging to Mexican society and free speech...."
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The Internet Dealers of Cuba
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-int...rs-of-cuba
EXCERPT: [...] “35 wireless hotspots. That’s nothing in a country of 11 million people. Could you imagine if in Manhattan you could only access the internet at 35 hotspots? That’s insane,” Jose Luis Martinez, communications director at the Miami-based Foundation for Human Rights in Cuba, told me. “They’re all censored and monitored [...] Like nearly everything else in Cuba, all internet access on the island is wholly controlled by the communist government. Whether you are accessing the “public” wifi through a hotspot, connecting in a hotel, or using one of the handful of government-owned computer labs, you must use a scratch card issued by the Empresa de Telecomunicaciones de Cuba S.A. (ETECSA), which is also the only cell phone and telephone company on the island.
[...] In many ways, dealing the internet in Cuba is a lot like dealing drugs. Eduardo is low on the operation’s totem pole. Every day, he gets a new supply of cards from his boss, who buys the cards 500 at a time. (The Cuban government tracks who purchases cards and in what quantities, so the higher ups presumably have an ETECSA contact or use a series of people to purchase the cards.) Other internet dealers go into business for themselves, buying an extra card here or there when they can and using the sales to subsidize their internet use. As far as I can tell, there are no turf wars: The cards are in such low supply that everyone wishes more people would sell....
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/how-mex...wn-dissent
EXCERPT: More than 75,000 automated Twitter accounts are being used in Mexico to combat protests and attack critics of the government, according to research presented by writer Erin Gallagher at the Chaos Communication Camp in Zehdenick, Germany earlier this month. [...] According to Gallagher’s research, Peñabots also target individual journalists and activists for smear campaigns, death threats, and other forms of harassment. The problem, she said, is that "social media is the new public square. Mexicans are relying on these networks to get their news out to the world and to communicate with each other... When these networks are manipulated, it is extremely damaging to Mexican society and free speech...."
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The Internet Dealers of Cuba
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-int...rs-of-cuba
EXCERPT: [...] “35 wireless hotspots. That’s nothing in a country of 11 million people. Could you imagine if in Manhattan you could only access the internet at 35 hotspots? That’s insane,” Jose Luis Martinez, communications director at the Miami-based Foundation for Human Rights in Cuba, told me. “They’re all censored and monitored [...] Like nearly everything else in Cuba, all internet access on the island is wholly controlled by the communist government. Whether you are accessing the “public” wifi through a hotspot, connecting in a hotel, or using one of the handful of government-owned computer labs, you must use a scratch card issued by the Empresa de Telecomunicaciones de Cuba S.A. (ETECSA), which is also the only cell phone and telephone company on the island.
[...] In many ways, dealing the internet in Cuba is a lot like dealing drugs. Eduardo is low on the operation’s totem pole. Every day, he gets a new supply of cards from his boss, who buys the cards 500 at a time. (The Cuban government tracks who purchases cards and in what quantities, so the higher ups presumably have an ETECSA contact or use a series of people to purchase the cards.) Other internet dealers go into business for themselves, buying an extra card here or there when they can and using the sales to subsidize their internet use. As far as I can tell, there are no turf wars: The cards are in such low supply that everyone wishes more people would sell....