BC POLITICS
Saved by @ThomassRichards

Last talk about Securing Democracy at #enigma2021: @jackhcable speaking about "THE FULL STACK PROBLEM OF ELECTION

 Let's imagine that elections use all the security measures security people have been advocating: risk-limiting audits, paper ballots, etc. Would people trust the elections more?
Jack would argue no. Most people don't understand this stuff and most of the claims people are making can't be disproven. And are massively bogus already.

Georgia did a full recount on paper ballots and it very much didn't stop people from doubting the election!
Are election security results in vain? The point of election security is to convince the loser they lost.

No! Have to focus on the whole stack, from election infrastructure to campaigns to people and mis/dis-informaton
One takeaway from the talk: the parts of the stack must work in tandem. Can't fight misinformation in a vacuum, but must build on other election security measures.
The voting process
* significant advances in recent years (e.g. paper ballots, risk-limiting audits, end-to-end verifiability)
* research needed in integrating these technologies
* expanding to mail-in voting?
But there's also internet voting
* we can't do it securely today [oh no voatz reference]
* we have to combat malware, authentication etc.
* if we could solve them, that would be great. But in the meantime voting has to be successful for everyone
* can improve accessibility through things like getting ballot online, filling it out, then returning through the mail
Election support systems
* less researched. Probably because they look boring
* Voter registration databases aren't working. Russians breached at least 2 states, targeted all 50 states
* little to no public scrutiny of these systems
* election night reporting -- this is a picture of one where there was a bug in reporting. [It was fixed but freaked a lot of people out]
A lot of the trouble with the security of election support systems is not that we don't know how to do it -- it's that we have to do it
Campaign security
* biggest unknown (see Sunny Consolvo's talk!)
* we must view campaign security as non-partisan and increase resources and services available
Public confidence
* major damage from domestic actors
* widespread mis/dis-information
* technical election security measures helps to debunk rumours floating around
Misinformation-fighting supply measures:
* platforms: downranking and deplatforming
* trusted institutions
* debunking & fact checks
Misinformation-fighting demand measures:
* media literacy
* increased civics education

[ Also note that @katestarbird will be giving a talk on misinformation don't miss it: https://t.co/a0PutRnHaI]
Let's fix election support systems!
* Much of this is applying security things we already know
[ Note: a lot of organizations have this problem 😭 ]
* engage in public research. Have a vuln disclosure policy so people can confidently help
Election security is a problem that can only be solved by working together: elections officials, security people, everyone

[end of talk]

More from Lea Kissner

Lea Kissner
Lea Kissner
@LeaKissner
Last up in Privacy Tech for #enigma2021, @xchatty speaking about "IMPLEMENTING DIFFERENTIAL PRIVACY FOR THE 2020

Differential privacy was invented in 2006. Seems like a long time but it's not a long time since a fundamental scientific invention. It took longer than that between the invention of public key cryptography and even the first version of SSL.


But even in 2020, we still can't meet user expectations.
* Data users expect consistent data releases
* Some people call synthetic data "fake data" like
"fake news"
* It's not clear what "quality assurance" and "data exploration" means in a DP framework


We just did the 2020 US census
* required to collect it by the constitution
* but required to maintain privacy by law

But that's hard! What if there were 10 people on the block and all the same sex and age? If you posted something like that, then you would know what everyone's sex and age was on the block.
TECH , TEACH
Lea Kissner
Lea Kissner
@LeaKissner
Next up in Privacy Technology at #enigma2021, Kelly Huang from @ethyca speaking about "GONE, BUT NOT "FORGOTTEN"—TECHNICAL & PRACTICAL CHALLENGES IN OPERATIONALIZING MODERN PRIVACY

Just imagine there's a global pandemic forcing everyone to stay home and buy their stuff over the internet. And you've been working on your sanitization-on-demand startup. You've got more users than you can count! ... literally, because your data's all over.

Now you're a multi-national international country with privacy issues because your information is all over the place.

Now a user writes to request you delete their data. Where is it? How do you do that? Who's responsible for privacy in your business.

How do you operationalize privacy rights?

Primary stakeholders:
* Legal
* Business
* Engineering

We spend a lot of time on Twitter analyzing the legal rulings, but it's harder where the "rubber meets the code" 🥁
TECH
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Lea Kissner
Lea Kissner
@LeaKissner
Next up at #enigma2021, Sanghyun Hong will be speaking about "A SOUND MIND IN A VULNERABLE BODY: PRACTICAL HARDWARE ATTACKS ON DEEP LEARNING"

(Hint: speaker is on the

In recent years ML models have worked from research labs to production, which makes ML security important. Adversarial ML research studies how to mess with ML

For example by messing with the training data (c.f. Tay which became super-racist super-fast) or by foiling ML models by changing inputs in ways humans can't see.


Prior work considers ML models in a standalone, mathematical way
* looks at the robustness in an isolated manner
* doesn't look at the whole ecosystem and how the model is used -- ML models are running in real hardware with real software which has real vulns!


This talk focuses on hardware-level vulnerabilities. This is particularly interesting because these can break cryptographic guarantees (because those are outside of their threat models)
e.g. fault injection attacks, side-channel attacks
SCIENCE
Lea Kissner
Lea Kissner
@LeaKissner
In more Securing Democracy at #enigma2021, @ChrFolini talking about "THE ADVENTUROUS TALE OF ONLINE VOTING IN

Switzerland is a direct democracy where citizens get to vote at least 4x/year, with a lot of mail-in voting. We have a long history of online voting.

Disclaimer: THIS IS NOT SWEDEN.

[I get the picture that @ChrFolini has had to explain the difference several times.]


Process around mail-in ballots.

[tl;dr it's very complicated and wasn't threat-modeled until recently]


But the in-person ballots are complicated, too!


Most security folks don't think that we can't make a secure online voting system.

@ChrFolini says this is because of encryption
[Note: this is not the main reason that a lot of people cite -- we're more worried about things like malware but it's complicated]
WORLD
Lea Kissner
Lea Kissner
@LeaKissner
We're kicking off the Privacy Tech session at #enigma2021 with Mitch Negus speaking about "NO DATA, NO PROBLEM—GIVING NUCLEAR INSPECTORS BETTER TOOLS WITHOUT REVEALING STATE

A nuclear catastrophe hasn't occurred... yet. So we need to stay vigilant. Nuclear inspectors go in according to treaties to check what's going on and check compliance with treaty rules.

But as sophisticated analytics become more common, states will only want to share the minimum amount of information necessary under the treaty.

But perhaps we can use MPC -- secure multi-party computation

Yao's garbled circuits were first demonstrated on the millionaire's problem -- figuring out who's richer without revealing actual amounts.

Used for other things like cryptocurrency these days.

Can we use this for nuclear inspection?

MPC can be used to compute anything computed by a computer [but it's expensive!]
TECH

More from Politics

Remi_1111FR \U0001f438 \U0001f64c \U0001f54a
Remi_1111FR 🐸 🙌 🕊...
@film_instant
17 / TRUMP / RED LINE / FRANCE / 21

THREAD

Trump owned France back in 2017 and never stopped since.

Q is using France as a mirror for the show.

USA Revolution 1776

[+13]

FRANCE Revolution 1989

ENJOY THE SHOW 2021 PATRIOTS

#OldestAllies 🇫🇷🇺🇸
POLITICS , TRUMP , GOVERNMENT
Mike Dunford
Mike Dunford
@questauthority
Election Litigation Update - Gohmert.

Reply brief is in. Let's have a look. They are, mercifully, underlength. They had 50 pages available, the PDF is 43 and some of that is cover page, signatures,

Interesting table of contents. Looks like they're packing a lot in, until you realize that much of the material that's important - like their response to the "you sued the wrong person" material and "injury in fact" take up very little space.


Looks like they decided to skip the table of authorities. Presumably GoogleDocWord ate it too bad for them to fix. This will certainly further endear them to the judge.


This is going to be interesting - leading off a reply brief with a "here's what our cause is about" is certainly a strategy. It's even a bold strategy.

Shall we dig deeper, Cotton?


"We live in a democratic republic in which the Vice President, who will more often than not be a candidate in the election, has the sole and unchallengeable power to decide who wins the election" is a hellofa take.
POLITICS
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Melissa (she/her)
Melissa (she/her)
@LiteraryMouse
In regards to the #CapitolCoup, I’m in a unique position. I monitored forums ahead of time and then was present for the coup itself.

These are my observations based on what I saw and the evidence that’s been collected so far. I reserve the right to adjust my analysis as needed.

Let’s talk about the organization of the coup first. Seeing some people insist that the coup must have been highly planned and coordinated.

Yes and no. This was a #StochasticCoup. We’ll see little evidence of direct communication between Trump and the insurrectionists.

Within the insurrectionists, there was not one group that executed the storming of the Capitol.

Rather, there were a number of smaller groups working independently towards the same goal. I expect you’ll see little evidence that these various groups communicated with each other.

What you will see is detailed planning and coordination within these small groups.

Then there were the joyriders, those Trump supporters who weren’t directly involved in any plotting but who were more than happy to go along for the ride once the coup was in motion.

After four years, the insurrectionists were carefully attuned to Trump’s messaging.

Every tweet and statement of his was treated as marching orders and carefully dissected for meaning.

It’s why shutting down Trump’s Twitter account was so important.
POLITICS , INSURRECTIONISTS
JEN KIRKMAN \U0001f469\U0001f3fb\u200d\U0001f4bb
JEN KIRKMAN 👩🏻‍💻...
@JenKirkman
1. For people mad at Dems. Can we try to understand how politics (not justice) works? Here are some things: the Dems simply wanted the phone call information to be added to the record. They threatened to call witnesses as a negotiation tactic - thus getting the Republicans to

2. do what the Dems originally wanted - enter the phone call on the record. If witnesses were called - the trial would have gone on for weeks - in the middle of a pandemic when relief HAS to be sent out now. And Merrick Garland has to be confirmed so the DOJ can get to work.

3. However, I WANT WITNESSES CALLED. I want them to have such explosive testimony that the whole world once again knows what it knows - that Trump is guilty. I want more Republican Senators to change their mind and vote to convict. The problem is? We would NEVER GET 17 to do so.

4. It fucking SUCKS. It SUCKS that the Democrats can't just call witnesses and make the Republican Senators appear to the world even more cowardly than they were - hearing that testimony and STILL voting to acquit. BUT that's the fantasy version where the media doesn't once again

5. start blaming Dems during this fantasy-witness-calling-trial for not getting Covid relief out, etc. The issue here is that NO MATTER WHAT - if Trump himself with Jesus back from the dead as his witness says, "I did it" the Republicans will acquit. The issue is that the GOP
POLITICS
Reed Hundt
Reed Hundt
@rehundt
1/Zach has the history right (again). I doubt the current political leadership read the book where Summers et al explained what they did, unless they look at borrowed copies. Here it is: https://t.co/4gyFiagaj3

2/ But the summary is that Summers, Geithner, Orszag, Emanuel agreed on telling Obama and Biden in December 2008 that about $800b was an adequate stimulus. Would lower unemployment just below 8% by late 2010. Romer thought $2.1T or $1.7T was needed to achieve full employment.

3/ They wouldn't let her make the case in writing for $1.2T because her number could leak. The reasons for $800b were: they wanted the bill passed by February, so they could move on to health care reform and cap and trade; they had no ways to spend more;

4/ spending more might kick off inflation or cause markets to fall for fear of inflation; that might lead to more bank runs; more bank runs might require a second TARP so they couldn't ask Congress for too much for recovery; Pelosi would give them whatever they asked

5/ for but they didn't think they could get the needed 1 or 2 R Senators quickly if they asked for more; they wanted 60 but had only 58 D Senators; popular "moonshots" or signature items in the package would take too long (Biden asked for that);
POLITICS

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foone
foone
@Foone
So there's a class of puzzles called "river crossing puzzles" which involve having to cross a river on a boat/bridge containing some set of individuals/items with restrictions on which ones can be on the boat/left on each shore, right?

and the most common subclass of these problems is the one where you have 3 items/animals to cross with.
This is alternatively called the "fox, goose, and bag of beans" or "wolf, goat, and cabbage" puzzle.

the idea is that your boat can only carry one item at a time, but if you leave the wolf/fox unattended with the goat/goose, the wolf/fox will eat the goat/goose.
and similarly, the goose/goat will eat the beans/cabbage if left alone

so you have to set up a set of actions that never leaves either side of the river in one of the lose-states.

the solution to this variant being:
1. take the goat/goose over
2. return empty
3. take the wolf/fox over
4. return with the goat/goose
5. take the cabbage/beans over
6. return empty
7. take the goat/goose over
GAMES
Jeet Heer
Jeet Heer
@HeerJeet
1. Now that Stan Lee is being eulogized far and wide, it's important to remember how marginal Stan Lee and his collaborators (Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko) were in the 1950s and 1960s.

2. Marvel Comics (before that Atlas) was just a cog in the machine of a bottom pulp publisher run by Martin Goodman, the husband of one of Lee's cousins. It was the lowest of the low in the publishing world.

3. Now Mario Puzo (not yet the author of the Godfather) shared offices with Stan Lee in the 1950s and 1960s. Puzo wrote for garrish men's adventure magazines and, like Lee, dreamed of writing a novel & breaking out. But Puzo looked down on Lee.

4. Flo Steinberg, 1960s secretary at Marvel: "They were always making jokes about us. They'd come in and giggle. mario Puzo would look in and would see us all working on his way to the office and say, 'Work faster, little elves. Christmas is coming.'"

5. When JFK was killed, the whole office of Magazine Management was stunned and quiet. Except Lee. He continued working. "He was still working on the comic books," Puzo said. "Like that was the most important thing in the world."
CULTURE
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\u0939\u0920\u092f\u094b\u0917\u0940
हठयोगी...
@hathyogi31
#3/thread on Angkor wat

Christianity and islam may be the largest religion of today’s world but Sanatan dharm has the largest religious monument in the world in the form of Angkor wat. It is situated in combodia and spread across over 400 acres / 1.6 km².


It was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1992, which encouraged an international effort to save the complex.
It was originally built as a Hindu temple dedicated to the god Vishnu. In Khmer, the Cambodian language, Angkor means "city" and Wat means "temple grounds".


So Angkor Wat means "Temple City". Its original name was Vrah Vishnuloka or Parama Vishnuloka, meaning the sacred dwelling of Vishnu in Sanskrit.
But, it gradually turned into a Buddhist temple towards the end of the 12th century & is still used for worship today.


Angkor Wat was initially designed and constructed in the first half of the 12th century, during the reign of Suryavarman II, as the king’s state temple and capital city. It was built without the aid of any machinery, as there was no machinery available at that time.


Evidence for these dates comes in part from inscriptions, which are vague, but also from the architectural design and artistic style of the temple and its associated sculptures.

Another aspect is that the five central towers of Angkor Wat symbolize the peaks of Mount Meru,
HISTORY
Anu Satheesh \U0001f1ee\U0001f1f3
Anu Satheesh 🇮🇳...
@AnuSatheesh5
Magudeswarar Temple, Kodumudi
#Erode
#Tamilnadutemples 🚩

Situated on the banks of the river Kaveri, Magudeswarar Temple is one among Paadal Petra Shiva Sthalam. Kshetram is famous Parihara Sthala for Naga Dosham and for performing Tarpanam to the departed souls.


There are 3 sannidhi here for Paramashiva, Mahavishnu and Brahma Deva.

Sthala Puranam says that once Adisesha and Vayu Deva placed Meru parvat at the centre to decide who is stronger among them. Parvatam was held tightly by Adisesha and Vayu blew the wind to push Parvatham.


In this struggle, peak of meru  parvatham broke into 7 pieces and fell in different places as precious gems. Diamond fell at  Kodumudi as Magudeswarar. Panchamirtham abhishekam is very famous here. Vanni tree situated here is very old which contains medicinal values.


It is believed that Agasthiya Muni did Prathishta of Shiva Lingam here. As Adisesha is one of the reason for creation of the temple, this is famous Parihara Sthalam for Naga Dosham. It is believed that those who


who take a bath in the river Kaveri and worship paramashiva and mahavishnu, will be cured of diseases and will get relief from all illness.

Om Namah Shivaye
Om Namo Narayanaya
🙏🕉🙏
ALL
Stephen Fasenfeld \U0001f600
Stephen Fasenfeld 😀...
@fasenfeld
1. “Who Are Ireland’s Members Of The World Economic Forum Implementing The Great Reset In 2021 ? 🧵1/28

🕵️🔎 Politicians, Musicians, Clergy, Bankers, Journalists, Human Rights, Artificial Intelligence, Sustainability, Corporations & Agriculture


2. In previous threads I have looked at 🇮🇪 key players in the Trilateral Commission as well as 🇮🇪 people who have attended the Bilderberger meetings. I also looked at the 🇮🇪 in the Young Global Leaders which is a site run by the WEF. You will see a lot of crossover between them.

3. The purpose of this thread is to compile all the Irish members into one thread for ease of access and reading rather than having to dive through the WEF site. This is by no means definitive and I will be adding more over time when they pop out of the woodwork.

4. Ireland’s WEF members are drawn from all walks of life but can be split into 2 separate areas. The WEF calls the first category “people” and the 2nd one “agenda contributors”. In total Ireland has a minimum of 61 members. Some of the names will be familiar and others will not

5. In this thread I’m just going to concentrate on the 21 people (there are probably a lot more). There are also 40 “agenda contributors” which I will cover in a separate thread. The agenda contributors are those who write articles or do research for the WEF site.
ECONOMY