Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by on Monday January 09 2017, @07:16PM   Printer-friendly
from the you-go-first-wikileaks-task-force dept.

WikiLeaks wants to start building a list of verified Twitter users that would include highly sensitive and personal information about their families, their finances and their housing situations.

"We are thinking of making an online database with all 'verified' twitter accounts & their family/job/financial/housing relationships," WikiLeaks tweeted Friday.

The disclosure organization, run by Julian Assange, says the information would be used for an artificial-intelligence program. But Twitter users immediately fired back, saying WikiLeaks would use the list to take political vengeance against those who criticize it.

Twitter "verifies" certain users, such as world leaders, nonprofit organizations and news outlets, with a blue check mark beside their names so that other users of the service can be confident about the posters' identities. WikiLeaks, which has a verified Twitter account, did not say whether it would subject itself to the scrutiny it was proposing. (It was also unclear whether, under its plan, WikiLeaks would seek to uncover information about the financial lives of Russian President Vladimir Putin or President-elect Donald Trump, both of whom are verified on Twitter.)

-- submitted from IRC


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @07:52PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @07:52PM (#451584)

    Given that it's from WaPo, the first question that pops into my mind is what kind of spin job is WaPo putting on what Wikileaks actually wants to do. WaPo is still butthurt that Clinton lost.

    Starting Score:    0  points
    Moderation   +1  
       Troll=1, Insightful=2, Total=3
    Extra 'Insightful' Modifier   0  

    Total Score:   1  
  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @08:01PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @08:01PM (#451587)

    Because hundreds of other news outlets haven't reported on it in exactly the same way.
    I think the problem is you are just butthurt that wapo reports facts that impinge on your reality.
    Tribal nihilism FTL.

    • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 09 2017, @08:10PM

      by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 09 2017, @08:10PM (#451594) Journal

      "hundreds of other news sites" just take for granted that something from WaPo or other "prestigious" news sites are truthful, and full of facts.

      http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2016/dec/13/2016-lie-year-fake-news/ [politifact.com]

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @08:18PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @08:18PM (#451598)

        You linked to something that has no direct bearing on the topic.
        If you have an intended meaning you wish to communicate then state it plainly so people can engage with it instead of trying to play mind reader.
        Point scoring by innuendo is for cowards.

        • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 09 2017, @08:24PM

          by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 09 2017, @08:24PM (#451603) Journal

          Reading comprehension, much? I linked to an article about bullshit reporting. EvilSS did the same, but he chose an article that is more directly pertinent. If you can't see the relevance, that is your failing, not mine.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @08:33PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @08:33PM (#451610)

            So what?
            You linked to an article that you intend as some generic support for some non-specific criticism you are trying to make.
            What is your POINT?
            State your arguments up front and directly so that people can engage with them.
            To do otherwise is to admit your arguments are too weak too survive examination.

            • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 09 2017, @08:49PM

              by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 09 2017, @08:49PM (#451615) Journal

              WaPo. MSM. A tweet was posted, and subsequently deleted. I look at the scant evidence, and wonder WTF it was all about. And, I wonder WTF MSM even cares about Wikileaks. I'm fairly sure that Wikileaks isn't going to mandate that a database be kept on all verified accounts, along with the financial records, family and other affiliations of those accountes, blah blah ad nauseum.

              My point is, there has to be more to this story, and trying to draw any conclusions at this point amounts to pure speculation. People who hate Assange and Wikileaks are going to speculate some wildly crazy stuff. People who like Assange and Wikileaks are going to dismiss most of that wildly crazy stuff.

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @09:23PM

                by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @09:23PM (#451645)

                > And, I wonder WTF MSM even cares about Wikileaks.

                Really?
                So now reporting on wikileaks isn't newsworthy.

                > trying to draw any conclusions at this point amounts to pure speculation

                WIkileaks has had plenty of opportunity to elaborate. That they did not is itself newsworthy.
                If an organization chooses to communicate through twitter then reporting on what they say on twitter is fair game.

    • (Score: 2) by EvilSS on Monday January 09 2017, @08:10PM

      by EvilSS (1456) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 09 2017, @08:10PM (#451595)
      You mean facts like how Russia infiltrated the US power grid? [fortune.com]
      • (Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @08:29PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @08:29PM (#451607)

        You linked to an article that disproves your implied criticism.
        That Fortune article literally does the opposite of parroting the wapo article.

        Furthermore wapo published a prominent correction at the top of the article [washingtonpost.com] within 12 hours of publication and then published an indepth follow-up [washingtonpost.com] fully admitting their error and providing new details and background.

        Lots of people seem to think that's an admission of failure. Its really a badge of integrity. Everybody screws up. Legit news publications issue retractions, ideological publishers let their errors silently slip out of the public's attention.

        • (Score: 2) by EvilSS on Monday January 09 2017, @08:50PM

          by EvilSS (1456) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 09 2017, @08:50PM (#451619)
          I'm not sure what words you are trying to put in my mouth, so let's be clear on this. My criticism of WaPo is this: Since Bezos bought them and targeted them to a younger audience, the quality of their reporting has plummeted. Their reporters now work with little editorial oversight, and being first is now more important that being right, which points to a slump in journalistic ethics. The article I linked to, in direct response to your assertion that they "... reports facts that impinge on your reality.", is a very recent, very serious example of just that type of sloppy, amateurish reporting. The story was rushed to press, with no fact checking, no verification at all. They didn't even bother to reach out to the utility in question to get a response. Any editor worth their salt would never have allowed that story to run, but in all likelihood an editor wasn't even involved. Printing a retraction to a story that should never, ever have been allowed to be published in the first place, and only after other media outlets call them out on it, is not a badge of integrity; it's a badge of shame.

          They don't report facts anymore. They publish lazy, hyperbolic articles to get clicks to sell ads and to hell with being accurate.
          • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @09:34PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @09:34PM (#451661)

            > Since Bezos bought them and targeted them to a younger audience, the quality of their reporting has plummeted.

            Sounds like you just don't like Bezos and are an attributing industry wide phenomenon to his ownership.

            > The story was rushed to press, with no fact checking, no verification at all.

            At best that's an exaggeration. They reported the on-the-record statements from three government officials - the governor and both of the state's senators. They also reported the official on-the-record statement from the electric company itself. Yes it turned out there was more to the story. But get fucking real man, your requirements are beyond reasonable. It sounds like you are just echoing greenwald's own invective.

            > They don't report facts anymore. They publish lazy, hyperbolic articles to get clicks to sell ads and to hell with being accurate.

            You just went meta. A hyperbolic accusation of hyperbole.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @09:14PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09 2017, @09:14PM (#451635)

      Epistomoligists should be having a field day. Their subject is becoming front-page news. When is a fact a fact? Certainly not because it was written up as one in the Washington Post. Why can't we build up trust over the internet? Truth is becoming slippery now that anyone can publish anything. Are there laws against lying? Maybe there should be. After all, lying is a sin.