Tag: riots

This Site Published Every Face From Parler’s Capitol Riot Videos

WHEN HACKERS EXPLOITED a bug in Parler to download all of the right-wing social media platform’s contents last week, they were surprised to find that many of the pictures and videos contained geolocation metadata revealing exactly how many of the site’s users had taken part in the invasion of the US Capitol building just days before. But the videos uploaded to Parler also contain an equally sensitive bounty of data sitting in plain sight: thousands of images of unmasked faces, many of whom participated in the Capitol riot. Now one website has done the work of cataloging and publishing every one of those faces in a single, easy-to-browse lineup.

Late last week, a website called Faces of the Riot appeared online, showing nothing but a vast grid of more than 6,000 images of faces, each one tagged only with a string of characters associated with the Parler video in which it appeared. The site’s creator tells WIRED that he used simple open source machine learning and facial recognition software to detect, extract, and deduplicate every face from the 827 videos that were posted to Parler from inside and outside the Capitol building on January 6, the day when radicalized Trump supporters stormed the building in a riot that resulted in five people’s deaths. The creator of Faces of the Riot says his goal is to allow anyone to easily sort through the faces pulled from those videos to identify someone they may know or recognize who took part in the mob, or even to reference the collected faces against FBI wanted posters and send a tip to law enforcement if they spot someone.

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Feds Ask Travel Companies (Hotels, Car Rentals, Bus Companies) To ID Suspected Capitol Rioters

The War on Terror has officially crossed the line by using the Capitol riot to destroy what little is left of our civil liberties.

Bloomberg News reported that the House Oversight Committee has asked travel companies to help law enforcement ID suspected Capitol rioters.

“The committee sent letters to hotel chains, bus lines, car rental companies and online travel agents, asking them to retain all records regarding reservations and services for the entire month of January for potential use, if necessary, in future law enforcement or Congressional investigations.”

When the feds openly ask travel companies to help them ID suspected rioters EVERYONE’S privacy is at risk.

As Forbes noted, the Feds sent letters to more than two dozen travel companies, including nine bus companies.

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Parler helped the FBI identify at least one person charged in connection with the Capitol riot

Parler is sharing information with the FBI for the Department of Justice’s investigations into the riot at the US Capitol.

An affidavit from an FBI special agent filed in court Tuesday says Eduardo Florea stockpiled more than 1,000 rounds of ammo and threatened to kill Sen.-elect Raphael Warnock of Georgia.

The affidavit says the FBI received records from Parler to identify the user behind the account “LoneWolfWar,” where the threats originated. Parler provided the phone number associated with the account, the affidavit says, and the FBI used it, and info from T-Mobile, to identify Florea.

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Let’s Look at a Worst Case Scenario – ‘Black Pill’ Edition

I want to fight. I want to be positive. But every once in a while I swallow the dreaded “Black Pill” (the belief that all is lost and there’s really no sense in moving on). What I’m about to write may sound as if I have swallowed the whole bottle, but I need to present a commentary on what I’ve been seeing for the past 10 months, and especially the last eight days.

The terms “insurrection,” “sedition,” and “treason” are being shouted by politicians and the corporate press (CP) like a 4-year-old the first time they discover the “F-word.” And their main target has been Donald Trump. If those terms were being associated with just the president, it would have most likely elicited a response from me. However, that’s not the point of this missive. Although the House voted to impeach Trump, the CP, and certain politicians, are not stopping at punishing only him, they are attempting to connect Trump’s most ardent supporters with voting for, and supporting, one they claim is guilty of treason. The way I interpret this is, the CP is saying voters and Trump factions have given “support” to an enemy of the State in order to punish them as well. The CP is asking regular people to identify anyone they can who was at, in or near the Capitol on 1/6/2021 and the arrests have started. Why would this concern me?

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The Lynch Mob Comes for Citizen Trump

The left wants to stigmatize Trump down through the ages with twin impeachments, and its hatred of him has overwhelmed any commitment they had to due process. Trump not only defeated the establishment in 2016. He got 74 million votes for a second term. Then, he defiantly refused to recognize that his defeat was fairly accomplished. Trump is hated because he will not play the role the left has assigned to him in its historic morality play, in which the left is always the triumphant star.      

The Washington Post is now demanding that the trial, conviction, and expulsion of Trump from the presidency begin before Joe Biden takes the oath in five days. This is a familiar mindset: the spirit of the lynch mob. No time for evidence. No need for a trial where both sides can be heard. No need for reflection. Just declare him guilty and hang him.  

Concerning the riot and rampage on the hill, the right has offered no rationalizations or justifications, as the left invariably has ready when its minions go too far. It is not the right, but the left that has, since the ’60s, condoned and excused and called for empathy and understanding of those who use violent means to advance political ends.     

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