Homeland Security Spying on Reddit Users
www.kenklippenstein.com
Leak show feds tracking anti-ICE Reddit users like "Budget-Chicken-2425"
    • Magnum, P.I.@infosec.pubEnglish
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      5 months ago

      So if you do something like call for a protest you’ll need to use a foreign VPN and a burner account.

  • Washedupcynic@lemmy.caEnglish
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    5 months ago

    Is that why reddit was IP blocking people from seeing content even though they weren’t logged in?

  • EvilBit@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    5 months ago

    Is Homeland Security chasing bots? Because that’s the bottiest name I’ve ever seen. If so, please continue. 🍿

    • Railcar8095@lemmy.worldEnglish
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      5 months ago

      I had a similar names. I didn’t care about “expressing myself” and didn’t want you link it to myself in any way, so every time I would just accept the random gibberish reddit suggests when creating a new account.

      Like my current RailcarXxxx username. It was just suggested I think when creating my first Lemmy, and just reused it through instances

      • JayGray91🐉🍕@piefed.socialEnglish
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        5 months ago

        Yeah now I’m kind of worried about my pseudonym. This isn’t my first pseudonym mind you, and it won’t be the last, but this is the most “well known” around my internet friends.

    • Otter@lemmy.caEnglish
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      5 months ago

      I find it odd, but a lot of newer users on Reddit go with the default suggested username and those follow the word-word-0000 template.

      At the same time, it might be better for privacy to do that since it’s less likely that someone can track you across platforms if you use the generator built into each platform.

      • Tollana1234567@lemmy.todayEnglish
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        5 months ago

        thats how they mass-create bot accounts, just create a large number without carefully making one that reddit wont immediately ban you on.

      • dan@upvote.auEnglish
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        5 months ago

        I see it a lot, too. Reddit’s been around for 20 years, so all the good usernames are already taken.

      • DarkSideOfTheMoon@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        5 months ago

        I did that with my new user. It’s easier to use an account for a year or two and burn it. I don’t care about the fake points. And I am not doing anything wrong. But if tou give a lot of oppinions it’s a lot of data for social engineering, so for privacy reason it’s a good practice to not be attached to any account.

      • JackbyDev@programming.devEnglish
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        5 months ago

        I think the current flow for Reddit account creation is they give you the auto generated username and you have to change it when you’re done creating the account. You don’t get to set it during creation. So because it’s an extra step I think some people don’t. (Though I may be misremembering. It’s been years since I used it.)

      • UnspecificGravity@piefed.socialEnglish
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        5 months ago

        Its been a long time since you could build relationships with other users in places like Reddit. The usernames don’t matter anymore so you may as well just use randoms. Your just going to get banned and make a new one anyways.

        • Tollana1234567@lemmy.todayEnglish
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          5 months ago

          it has been flooded with bots since '16, when russia got involved with reddit through propaganda. so people are quite suspicious around other users, accusing them bots.

  • Sam_Bass@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    5 months ago

    If they really want to negate “reputational risk”, they should look closer at themselves. Alas, theyll never do that

  • Bruncvik@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    5 months ago

    Learned from growing up in a communist dictatorship: don’t discuss politics and religion with strangers. And even with friends or acquaintances, don’t discuss it in writing. It doesn’t mean you can’t have strong opinions, but don’t make them public. Talking (not writing) one-to-one or in small groups eventually toppled almost all communist dictatotships, so there’s absolutely no need to broadcast your opinions, unless your goal is to be martyred.

      • themurphy@lemmy.mlEnglish
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        5 months ago

        Well, there is no such thing as communism with a dictator. It’s simply two opposites.

        Communism is without a state. Meaning no true communist country have ever existed in modern time.

        • pazuzuzu@leminal.spaceEnglish
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          5 months ago

          Please don’t argue theory definitions with someone who lived through the reality, its just straight insensitive

          • Djehngo@lemmy.worldEnglish
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            5 months ago

            They are arguing the definitions with someone who was “arguing” with someone who lived through the reality

          • eskimofry@lemmy.worldEnglish
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            5 months ago

            I got shocked the other day stepping on live wires… I now have a degree in Electrical Engineering. (Actually Not: My experience is not the same as expertise)

            • thedirtyknapkin@lemmy.worldEnglish
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              5 months ago

              they didn’t say they were wrong, just an asshole.

              it’s like someone died to a live wire and you correct their family that it was the amps not the voltage that killed them. you’re not wrong, but you’re a tone deaf dickhead.

              • Katrisia@lemmy.todayEnglish
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                5 months ago

                While I agree, there’s also a risk in letting the hypothetical family cause alarm about something false around electricity or whatever (misinformation).

  • betanumerus@lemmy.caEnglish
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    5 months ago

    They’re not anti-ICE, they’re anti-abuse. If ICE chooses to abuse, ICE chooses to become a target of everyone who opposes abuse.

        • Linkalee@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
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          5 months ago

          Right? Such a dramatic mental image. It’s almost as if they want you to think of ICE as a bunch of barbaric cavemen with clubs.

          No, ICE would just shoot you before you got a word out about abuse.

  • Baguette@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
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    5 months ago

    Tbh if its a social/discussion based website, it will have federal agents monitoring it. Lemmy isn’t free from this either, though in our defense we are probably pretty low on the watchlist (but then again who knows)

  • FauxLiving@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    5 months ago

    Budget-Chicken-2425, waking up one day to find out the entire world is reading your FBI domestic terrorist dossier:

    That’s enough to radicalize a chicken.

      • hector@lemmy.todayEnglish
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        5 months ago

        Ha, homeland security is back to it’s old tricks. Probably not just them now, but they were submitting lists of users and social media was finding other pretexts to violate/ban them. I’m pretty sure some of my previous accounts were on those lists.

        As always, they got the support to do it by stressing these rw accounts denying vaccinations and elections and the like, and then the fascists in homeland security predictably went after the left with it primarily. Often going after things like parody accounts, allowed under the rules, for making fun of political leaders. It’s all dishonest. As per reporting in The Intercept at the time. The leak of information covered like twitter and FB and I forget, but I’ve no doubt it extends to other platforms, and other units than the one we learned about in homeland security, that is just the tip of the iceberg we can see above the reflection of that ocean of social media.

        I am saying an agency gave lists of users to violate that included his, and that reddit found excuses to violate them, likely for unrelated reasons that are not even against the rules, they don’t have to try, so they don’t try, to enforce rules fairly. Which is why we need the fediverse to be constructed better to reach critical mass. We need clear rules and enforcements with appeals that end in jury trials of users for actions.