I just did a couple of updates and I haven't talked about it in a while so may I please do a quick thread on my web site MegaGladys ( https://megagladys.com/ )?
It's a set of eight tools made for getting information on people with #Wikipedia pages. Useful for #OSINT, #journalism, etc. Free, no ads.
Just saw someone post this online, and chuckled at their misguided attempt to hide their information. (barcode underneath your address can be used to precisely geolocate your address) #privacy#postage#barcode#cybersecurity#osint
Since February 2022 grain exports from occupied Crimea have skyrocketed; it's widely assumed this is coming from newly occupied territories of #ukraine. A 'shadow fleet' exports it to Russia's partners around the world.
Despite attempts to hide, open source information can still reveal a great deal about these voyages.
In this case, we tracked two large cargo ships — new additions to the 'ghost fleet' — from Sevastopol to #Iran at every step of the way.
small #OSINT tidbit: add inurl:"Special:AllPages" to search through instances of MediaWiki (the framework behind Wikipedia) that have a public page listing all the pages on the wiki
cc @sector035 & @cyb_detective - maybe this is interesting to your audiences?
À #VIGINUM, nous avons pour mission de détecter et caractériser les manipulations de l'information impliquant des acteurs étrangers dans le débat public français.
Nous recrutons un•e développeur•se fullstack pour renforcer le pôle technique. Au programme, pas mal de #scraping et de collecte de données mais aussi développement d'outils en interne.
We've heard Twitter used to be the go-to place for the OSINT community, but not since Musk took over. Is that true? 👀 Do you find Mastodon better or worse than Twitter for #OSINT research? What are your thoughts on other platforms?
1/11 Petra Hofmann von den „Waldbürgern“ #BadSalzungen ist führende Aktivistin von „Freies Thüringen“. Sie marschiert bei Reichsbürgern für das „Fürstentum Sachsen-Weimar-Eisenach“ auf. Über eine staatliche Förderung für "Mehr Frauen in die Politik" kam sie in die Kommunalpolitik und kandidiert nun für die #NoAfD.
11/11 Alle Infos sind aus öffentlichen Quellen (#OSINT) und Hofmann tritt mit all den rechten Aktivitäten offen auf. Warum die Gleichstellungsbeauftragte und Freien Wähler #Wartburgkreis eine Reichsbürgerin fördern, bis sie über die #NoAfD in den Kreistag einzieht?
Aktuell laufen wieder Spamwellen durchs Land. Eine bot einen angeblichen Schweizer #Bitcoin-ETF an, mit zuverlässiger Firma und offizieller Zulassung dahinter. Das wäre doch das ideale Investment für klamme Kassen!
Doch schon nach wenigen Klicks war klar: Da stimmt ganz vieles nicht.
Herausgekommen ist auch eine Checkliste mit 12 einfachen Regeln, wie man potenziell betrügerische Webseiten erkennen kann.
Aber merke: Die Betrüger werden versuchen, einige dieser Regeln beim nächsten Mal besser zu beachten. Nur weil einige wenige Informationen plausibel klingen, heisst das nicht, dass alles vertrauenswürdig ist!
Im #DNIP-Artikel geht die Geschichte noch etwas weiter, über eine angebliche #KI-basierte Investvmentplattform. Aber auch da sieht es düster aus: Gleicher Registrierungsprozess mit überraschendem, unbekannten Telefonanruf uvam.
Ich nenne auch die Tools, mit denen ich gearbeitet habe. Weil: Jedem von euch wird das im Freundes- oder Familienkreis mal begegnen. Und dann ist es gut, Argumente produzieren zu können.
@sylkegruhnwald sprach mit Strafrechtsprofessorin Monika Simmler zu #Ethik und Gefahren von Open Source Intelligence, also der Nutzung öffentlicher Informationen für die Strafverfolgung. Dabei wird intensiv die Problematik der #Biometrie erläutert.
Simmler vertritt dabei die Ansicht, dass #Gesichtserkennung durch CH-Behörden aktuell verboten sei, da nicht explizit erlaubt.
Wikipedia Data Makes Better News Search: Stract Gossip Machine
Lately I've been spending a lot of time building my own tools as the state of search gets more disappointing. My newest effort is called Stract Gossip Machine. SGM uses historical audience interest as represented by Wikipedia page views to identify days with a higher likelihood of having relevant news about a topic, then creates…
I have been working on this since yesterday afternoon. I'm not entirely satisfied with it but you're welcome to play with it.
Temporal Topic Explorer uses Stract's search API and URL patterns to browse news topics by month. One day at a time.
It's an interesting way to explore topics that cover many months (try coronavirus in April 2020) or shock events that caused a big shift (try King Charles in September 2022).
Time for another #osint#geolocation puzzle! This was from a family vacation many years ago.
What amusement park was I at?
What ride am I on? Can you identify the approximate location within the ride?
Roughly was the photo taken? Provide "not before" and "not after" bounds (although if you think you can narrow it down to a specific day, be my guest!)
As usual, please CW guesses or solutions to avoid spoilers for other people.
🚨Cambridge Analytica's website resurfaced in 2023, but something was off. Using #OSINT tools, we found that an obscure Japanese medication company took it over & reused it to gain clicks & drive traffic to their page.
➡️Explore this case study & learn tools to investigate compromised websites.🕵️♂️ https://influenceindustry.org/en/explorer/case-studies/investigating-compromised-websites/
The terrible human toll in Gaza has many causes.
A chilling investigation by +972 highlights efficiency:
An engineer: “When a 3-year-old girl is killed in a home in Gaza, it’s because someone in the army decided it wasn’t a big deal for her to be killed.”
An AI outputs "100 targets a day". Like a factory with murder delivery:
"According to the investigation, another reason for the large number of targets, and the extensive harm to civilian life in Gaza, is the widespread use of a system called “Habsora” (“The Gospel”), which is largely built on artificial intelligence and can “generate” targets almost automatically at a rate that far exceeds what was previously possible. This AI system, as described by a former intelligence officer, essentially facilitates a “mass assassination factory.”"
"The third is “power targets,” which includes high-rises and residential towers in the heart of cities, and public buildings such as universities, banks, and government offices."
It was easier to locate the individuals in their private houses.
“We were not interested in killing operatives only when they were in a military building or engaged in a military activity. On the contrary, the IDF bombed them in homes without hesitation, as a first option. It’s much easier to bomb a family’s home. The system is built to look for them in these situations.”