I'm not a follower of Twitter, in my view it is open to all sorts of abuse and it seems to be yet another bad habit this country has picked up from the USA - despite that, it does have a few twit followers on this bulletin board so I thought it might be a good idea to start a TWIT thread where twits could post various twit comments without clogging up other threads with utter twit nonsense.

Edward Snowden should feel very proud of himself as he enjoys the comfort of his Russian safe haven. Not only has the whistle-blower’s treachery in revealing how America and its allies spy on their enemies made him the darling of the liberal Left. It now transpires that Snowden’s exposé has educated a whole new generation of extremists about how best to exploit the power of the web to peddle their militant ideology.


As far as Islamist terrorists fighting in Iraq and Syria are concerned, to have a “Snowden-approved” security system on their mobile phones and personal computers is to possess the ultimate in internet accessories. During his work as a contractor at America’s National Security Agency (NSA), Snowden gathered information about how it and its British equivalent, the GCHQ listening centre at Cheltenham, accessed social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook to monitor the activities of criminals and terrorists.


As a result, groups that use the internet for their own sinister purposes have changed the way they communicate so as to evade detection by Western security agencies. Aided by the increased use of encryption software by the leading internet service providers, terrorist groups such as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil) have found that, simply by adding freely available security programs and apps to their devices, they can conceal their activities from prying eyes.


It is not just about organising terrorist attacks. Winning the propaganda battle is vital in any conflict – and thanks to Snowden, Isil has proved adept at using its new-found mastery of the internet to advertise both the dramatic success it has enjoyed in capturing large swathes of Syria and Iraq, and the barbaric methods it employs to strike fear into the hearts of its enemies.


As Robert Hannigan, who took over as GCHQ’s new director earlier this week, has pointed out, the way today’s Islamist extremists use the internet is fundamentally different to the antiquated approach of Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda, which saw it primarily as a means of communication between different terror cells. According to Mr Hannigan, Isil has “embraced the web as a noisy channel in which to promote itself, intimidate people, and radicalise new recruits”.


Isil is the first terrorist group whose members have grown up using computers, and the group has demonstrated a high level of sophistication both in the way it produces its propaganda videos and in how it expertly exploits social media networks to ensure they attract a large following.

For example, the gruesome execution videos of Western hostages such as the US journalist James Foley are carefully stage-managed, in order to capture the full horror of the crime without explicitly showing the exact moment when the captive is decapitated – thereby staying within the social media guidelines that ban the dissemination of acts of extreme violence.

Isil has also proved adept at making sure its cheap, home-made videos reach the widest possible audience. One successful tactic is to hijack popular Twitter hashtags, such as those relating to the recent referendum on Scottish independence or last summer’s World Cup in Brazil, which enables its hateful message to reach a far wider audience than its traditional following within the radicalised Islamist community.

Preventing Isil, as well as other criminal organisations such as paedophile rings, from exploiting the internet in this manner would be perfectly feasible if the intelligence agencies still retained the ability to track the location where the material originated. But thanks to Snowden, renegade groups are now well-acquainted with the techniques that organisations such as the NSA and GCHQ have employed in the past to identify potential terrorist cells – including accessing social media websites and private emails alongside the more traditional interception of phone calls.

In the post-Snowden world, this has become immeasurably more difficult – not least because the whistle-blower’s revelations prompted many of the world’s leading social media companies to tighten up their security arrangements, primarily to reassure customers that their private activities were safe from the activities of intelligence-seeking eavesdroppers.

Both Apple and Google have recently changed their default settings to make encryption an opt-out rather than an opt-in feature. Moreover, the cosy relationship that existed pre-Snowden between the service providers and the spooks, which meant the agencies were given details of the access codes, is now dead: it ended the moment Snowden’s revelations provoked a public outcry on both sides of the Atlantic about the alleged mass surveillance this allowed.

Subsequent attempts to heal the rift have foundered over the internet firms’ erroneous belief that their interests are best served by putting a higher priority on protecting their customers than on preventing acts of terrorism.

But if, as Mr Hannigan contends, these companies have become the unwitting “command and control networks” for groups such as Isil, it is very much in their interests to cooperate. Otherwise, when the next bomb goes off in London or New York, they could have some difficult questions to answer.

The Telegraph

By Steven Swinford, Senior Political Correspondent Canberra
4:48AM GMT 14 Nov 2014
PM warns tech companies that internet cannot remain an 'ungoverned space'

Facebook, Google, Twitter and other technology giants must “live up to their social responsibilities” and do more to take down extremist material from the internet, David Cameron has suggested.

Mr Cameron said that the internet cannot remain an “ungoverned space” and that technology companies must be “more proactive” in helping authorities remove “harmful” material.

His intervention came after Robert Hannigan, the new head of GCHQ, warned last month that Facebook and Twitter have become “command and control centres” for Isil terrorists.

The security services are increasingly concerned that jihadists are exploiting social networking websites to spread their propaganda.

Meanwhile, the Metropolitan Police is currently taking down one terrorist-related posting every ten minutes from the internet, equivalent to 5,000 a week.

Mr Cameron disclosed that after negotiations lead by Downing Street, internet service providers including Virgin, Sky, BT and Talk Talk have agreed to incorporate a button enabling the public to report extremist material on their websites.

They have also agreed to ensure that their child protection filters protect young people from being exposed to jihadist material online.

However, Mr Cameron indicated that he wants to see major technology companies go further.

In his address to the Australian Parliament ahead of the G20 summit, Mr Cameron said: "A new and pressing challenge is getting extremist material taken down from the internet. There is a role for government in that. We must not allow the internet to be an ungoverned space.

"But there is a role for companies too. In the UK we are pushing companies to do more, including strengthening filters, improving reporting mechanisms and being more proactive in taking down this harmful material.

"We are making progress but there is further to go. This is their social responsibility. And we expect them to live up to it."

The Metropolitan Police is host to a counter terrorism unit dedicated to identifying and removing extreme graphic material from the internet.

In an average week the unit removes over 1,000 pieces of content that breach the terrorism act, 800 of which are related to Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.

A Downing Street spokesman said: “We will now need to do further work with industry to implement this in practice. And we will keep pressing internet companies to be more proactive given the scale of threats and persistent propaganda from the terrorist groups.”

Mr Cameron made the announcement after unveiling a series of new anti-terror laws, including the power to bar terror suspects from returning to Britain for at least two years.

Earlier this month Mr Hannigan warned that Isil terrorists have “embraced the web” and are using it to intimidate people and inspire “would-be jihadis” from all over the world to join them.

He urged the companies to work more closely with the security services, arguing that it is time for them to confront "some uncomfortable truths" and that privacy is not an "absolute right".

He suggested that unless US technology companies co-operate, new laws will be needed to ensure that intelligence agencies are able to track and pursue terrorists.

His comments represent some of the most outspoken criticism yet of US technology giants by the security services, and come amid growing tensions following leaks by whistleblower Edward Snowden.

He highlighted the eruption of extremist jihadi material online on websites such as Twitter, Facebook and Whatsapp, and said that terrorists are now able to hide their identities using encryption tools which were once only available to states.

He said that in the past, al-Qaeda and its terrorists have used the internet as a place to anonymously distribute material or "meet in dark spaces".

Isil, however, has taken a much more direct approach, using social networking services to get their messages across in a "language their peers understand".

He highlighted the production values of videos in which they attack towns, fire weapons and detonate explosives, saying that they have a "self-conscious online gaming quality".

He said that even the groups grotesque videos of beheadings highlight the sophistication of their use of social media. "This time the 'production values' were high and the videos stopped short of showing

the actual beheading," he said.

By Dan Hodges
9:42AM GMT 25 Nov 2014
The Left's rhetoric has become as toxic as that of the hard-Right

This morning I got up, made myself a cup of tea, got myself a bowl of cereal and logged onto Twitter. That’s how the out of touch, metropolitan media class starts its day.

At the top of my messages was a post from someone called Mike Campbell. To the best of my knowledge I haven’t come across Mike before. We don’t correspond regularly, or follow each other. But according to his biography he's an RMT trade union rep and a socialist.

His message referred to the Guardian columnist and food blogger Jack Monroe. “She didn't tweet about Cameron's son. She tweeted about Cameron. Even you should be able to work that out”, he said.

This was a reference to a tweet Monroe had herself sent as part of the “#CameronMustGo” Twitter campaign. Her tweet read: “Because he uses stories about his dead son as misty-eyed rhetoric to legitimise selling our NHS to his friends: “#CameronMustGo”.

When I saw Monroe’s message I thought “that’s horrible”, said so, then carried on working on yesterday’s post about Ukip and their repatriation policy. Then I pottered about a bit, did some work on a book I’m writing, then returned to have another browse on Twitter.

By this point my timeline was filling up with two distinct threads. The first related to my Ukip post. It basically consisted of a few Ukip supporters claiming I’d made up the whole thing, (I didn’t, read the post), and a lot of others coming up with stuff about me being a race traitor, a member of the LibLabCon, and inviting me to combine sex with travel.

The second was from people defending Jack Monroe. They were posting about me being a traitor to the Labour Party, a closet Tory, and comparing me to various intimate parts of the male and female anatomy.

So I leapt into the Twitter mosh pit, and began happily tweeting my responses. After a while, I noticed something weird. The Kippers and the CamMustGoers started to merge. I was literally sending the same responses to both groups of people. “No, I’m not a traitor to my race. I just don’t like racists”. “No, I’m not a traitor to the Labour Party. I just don’t like people who play politics with other people’s dead children”. And then I realised I wasn’t as happy as I thought I was.

I write a lot of critical stuff about Ed Miliband and the Labour Party. And a lot of the people who read it desperately, desperately want them both to prevail at the next election. So when they dish out the “you’re a traitor stuff”, I get it. I don’t think they quite understand what the job of being a political commentator entails, but I used to be a Labour Party member, so I grasp the tribal antipathy.

In fact, I’ve still got a little bit of that tribalism lurking someone deep down inside of me. I must have. Because yesterday, when I saw the Right an the Left engaged in the same desperate attempt to defend the utterly indefensible, I thought to myself: “Hang on. You’re on the Left. Aren’t you supposed to be better than that?”

It would be a stretch for me to claim some of my best friends are Ukip supporters. But I know several people who work in the party who are good, decent, honourable, people. When I went to the party’s conference in Doncaster I met several ordinary Ukip activists who were funny, warm, generous and clearly believe passionately in their party and its cause.

But I’m not going to lie. I think Ukip is a thoroughly racist, thoroughly prejudiced, thoroughly reactionary party. And I think the majority of its core supporters reflect that. Racism. Islamophobia. Homophobia. Misogyny. Rightly or wrongly, those are the values I associate with Ukip.

It may sound ludicrously simplistic, but until recently I genuinely thought people on the Right were the bad guys and the people on the Left were the good guys. In my mind’s eye, the Left still retained a semblance of moral authority. Yes, the Right were good at running the economy and taking the hard choices and all the usual “firm but fair” clichés. But it was still the Left who had cornered the market on compassion and fairness and basic humanity.

Then I saw Jack Monroe’s tweet. Or, even more tellingly, the response of the Left to Jack Monroe’s tweet.

The Left is losing its way. Not in an “Ed Miliband isn’t going to win Stockton South”, kind of way. In a “where the hell did we put that moral compass of ours?” kind of way.

When people can’t look at a tweet publicly taunting a man over the death of his six-year-old son and realise there is something deeply, horribly wrong, then they have a problem. If they can’t understand that a tweet like that transcends the most basic laws of human decency, they have a problem. And if they can’t simply and unequivocally condemn that tweet, without constructing straw men, throwing deflections and trying to draw spurious moral parallels, then they have a serious, serious problem.

That is the Left’s problem this morning. “Oh what, the whole Left?” someone will no doubt ask, facetiously. No, not all of the Left. In the same way not all of Ukip’s supporters advocate repatriation, or stigmatising people on trains who don’t speak English, or whipping up moral panics about Romanians. But enough. Too many.

Yesterday, the organisers of the #CameronMustGo campaign were boasting of their success. Their message was being tweeted 100,000 times a day, they claimed. So where were the tweets of condemnation for Jack Monroe? Where were the angry voices denouncing her for hijacking their campaign, or distorting its message? The answer, of course, is nothing had been hijacked or distorted. Cameron has to go. By any means necessary.

Now the sharks of the Right are circling themselves. Jack Monroe is receiving her own vile online abuse. In response her abusers will be abused. And the whole tawdry, vicious spiral will continue.

Perhaps I’m being naive. Maybe the Left never occupied the moral high ground. When I worked for the Labour Party maybe I was one of the people who unwittingly helped negotiate its surrender.

I don’t know. What I do know is some of the stuff the Left is coming out with at the moment is as toxic and malign and devoid of basic humanity as anything I’ve ever seen from the hard-Right. Both are now equally blinded by their own brand of narrow, ideological hatred.

So let me respond to Mike Campbell. Jack Monroe did tweet about David Cameron’s son, Mike. The words “he uses stories about his dead son as misty-eyed rhetoric” are the giveaway.

You’re an RMT official and a socialist. She was wrong. Wasn’t she?

What is a troll?

Chris Carson

Sounds like anyone who disagree's with another persons opinion.


wtf?

No somebody who follows someone around on a social platform making nasty spiteful and aggressive comments after another has posted.

Sometimes it can be of a sexual nature.

Who's after your ass gf?


Hint...it's not me sweety!

Errrr Mike740, Goldfinger, Mick TARQUIN (don't you just love that) Kipper, Disco Dave, Purple etc etc etc LOL!!!

THURSDAY 11 DECEMBER 2014 India , UK
Unmasked: the man behind top Islamic State Twitter account


The most influential pro-Islamic State Twitter account to be followed by foreign jihadis - Shami Witness - is shut down after a Channel 4 News investigation uncovers the identity of the man behind it


He spent his mornings, afternoons and evenings sending thousands of tweets of propaganda about the Islamic State militant group, acting as the leading conduit of information between jihadis, supporters, and recruits.

His tweets, written under the name Shami Witness, were seen two million times each month, making him perhaps the most influential Islamic State Twitter account, with over 17,700 followers.


Two thirds of all foreign fighters on Twitter followed him. When a fighter's Twitter account is suspended, he often promoted the new one and urged people to follow it.

He spoke to British jihadis regularly, before they leave to join the Islamic State, after they arrived, and if they died he praised them as martyrs.

He has until now been able to remain anonymous, avoiding questions about his motives and his central role in the Islamic State's propaganda war, but a Channel 4 News investigation can today reveal that the man operating the account is called Mehdi and he is an executive in Bangalore working for an Indian conglomerate.

Channel 4 News has chosen not to reveal his full name as he says his life would be in danger if his true identity was made public.

Mehdi said he would have gone to join Islamic State himself, but his family were financially dependent on him: "If I had a chance to leave everything and join them I might have.. my family needs me here."

On his Facebook pages he regularly shares jokes, funny images and talks about superhero movies, posting pictures of pizza dinners with friends, and Hawaiian parties at work.

Elsewhere on Facebook there are indications of his Islamist ideology, in conversations about Libya and Egyptian uprisings.

After being contacted by Channel 4 News, Mehdi shut down the Shami Witness account.

Social media conflict
A recent report by the Brookings Institute found social media to be one of the key organizational strengths of the Islamic State, finding that it uses such channels "to spread and legitimise IS's ideology, activities, and objectives, and to recruit and acquire international support."

The man behind Shami Witness posted thousands of updates to the @ShamiWitness Twitter account every month, usually from his mobile phone.

Using the @ShamiWitness account he five times tweeted the video of the execution of US aid worker Peter Kassig, and dozens of Syrian soldiers within minutes of it being uploaded to the internet.

"May allah guide, protect, strengthen and expand the Islamic State ... Islamic State brought peace, autonomy, zero corruption, low crime-rate", he wrote on Twitter in November.

Mehdi said of Iftikhar Jaman, one of the British jihadists from Portsmouth killed fighting for Islamic State, that: "you bros [brothers] talked the talk, walked the walk".

And he said to British fighter Mehdi Hassan "May Allah give you brothers decisive victory there". Hassan later died fighting in Kobane.

To another British fighter he said: "may Allah reward you" and quoted one British fighter's suggested that the rebel Islamic Front poses a greater risk to the Islamic State than the secularist rebels of the Free Syrian Army.

ShamiWitness seemed to express glee at the deaths and rapes of Kurdish fighters on Twitter, but later said that this comment was taken out of context.

He had written and later deleted the tweet where he said: "@ArjDnn I should thank PKK for recruiting female fighters, specially the ones caught alive by rebels. lol".

But in his real life, he had spoken out against rape on Facebook.


— Shami Witness (@ShamiWitness) December 10, 2014

By Agency
9:34PM GMT 06 Jan 2015
A Labour councillor has been suspended after she tweeted a parody of a Conservative poster which had been doctored to include an image of a Nazi death camp

A Labour councillor has been suspended by the party for sharing on social media a parody of a Conservative election poster doctored to include an image of a Nazi death camp.

Rosemary Healy, who represents the Mapperley ward on Nottingham City Council, insisted she had not spotted what the picture was of when she sent it on to more than 1,500 followers on Twitter and expressed "profound apologies".

But the party confirmed that the council's executive assistant for community protection had been suspended amid closer-than-ever scrutiny of politicians' internet postings in the run-up to May's general elections.

The original post shared by Ms Healy was an altered version of a Tory poster - the original of which was mocked after it emerged the photo of a country road featured above the slogan "Let's stay on the road to a stronger economy" was of one in Germany, not the UK.

It was posted by the @ThomasPride account but replaced the road with a picture of the railway lines leading into the notorious Auschwitz camp where more than a million people - almost all Jews - died during the Second World War.

"The new Tory campaign poster featuring a German road's a bit controversial" the post quipped - adding the slogan "more people on zero hours, more tax cuts for the rich, no more NHS".

Ms Healy quickly deleted the Tweet and posted: "Profound apologies for that retweet which was a genuine mistake and would never have been retweeted had I recognised it for what it was."

The Conservative group leader on Nottingham City Council, Cllr Georgina Culley, told the website: "This trivialises the horrors of the holocaust and I think Councillor Healy and her party should be ashamed.

"The city council should also act to distance itself from the perpetuation of these tweets, such remarks are offensive and a public representative should know better."

The user of the Thomas Pride account defended the image against complaints from others on the social media network that it was "deeply ignorant" and "belittles the Holocaust" - insisting it was legitimate satire and that he was of Polish descent.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/11341057/US-military-twitter-account-hacked-by-Isil-live.html