Tag: technology

Meet the Spyware Companies Preparing to Unleash Their Tech During Trump’s 2nd Term

In late September, the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement signed a $2 million one-year contract with controversial Israeli spyware vendor Paragon Solutions. The contract involved Paragon’s US subsidiary based in Chantilly, Virginia and ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations Division 3.

Paragon claims its tools can help law enforcement and governments remotely crack encrypted messaging platforms like WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal, and Facebook Messenger.

The agreement calls for Paragon to provide ICE with a “fully configured proprietary solution including license, hardware, warranty, maintenance and training.” The agreement was first reported on by Wired.

Within weeks of the ICE-Paragon contract becoming public Wired reported the contract was under review by the White House to see if it violates a 2023 Executive Order issued by the Biden administration. Executive Order 14093 was signed by President Joe Biden in March 2023 as part of an ongoing US government effort specifically aimed at restricting the use of commercial spyware by U.S. agencies.

The EO says the US government will continue to promote the “responsible use” of spyware that aligns with promoting “democratic values”. Despite the U.S. government efforts to prosecute journalists like Julian Assange, the EO claims the U.S. has an interest in “promoting respect for human rights; and defending activists, dissidents, and journalists against threats to their freedom and dignity.”

The Biden administration has also made efforts to impact the commercial spyware market, including placing spyware vendors like Israeli firm NSO Group and Intellexa on the “Entity List” which prevents any US companies from doing business with them. The Biden White House has also implemented a visa restriction policy for individuals “who have been involved in the development and sale of commercial spyware or who are immediate family members of those involved.”

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Apple patent uses FRT with ‘body data’ so cameras can ID people without seeing faces

Apple has been granted a patent for “identity recognition utilizing face-associated body characteristics.” The face recognition technology is anticipated to appear in a forthcoming smart security product from the tech giant.

Patent No. 12154386 2B, filed in May 2022 and granted on November 26, 2024, describes a system that associates facial recognition with other body characteristics, which might include things like clothing, gait, or gesture, to recognize certain people even if their faces are not visible to the camera.

The patent outlines the problem it intends to solve in clear terms: “sometimes a video camera may not be able to perform facial recognition of a person, given a particular video feed.”

It then describes the capability to monitor a video feed and determine, based on the analysis of video frames and previously stored face and body biometrics, whether an identification can be made with a primary body characteristic (face) or requires a secondary characteristic.

The system might work by linking a gallery of “body croppings” such as torso, arms or legs with their face biometrics, then comparing the data with a live video feed. It proceeds in a stepped approach, identifying face, then body parts, then, if needed, “physical characteristics” that could include body shape, skin color, or the texture or color of clothing. The order of operations is adaptable to the scenario.

The resulting data constitutes a cluster of “bodyprints” which can be assigned a confidence score against a person’s faceprint and other characteristics. Since there is a limited time in which certain identifiers are useful (clothing, for instance), the technology can utilize storage periods as brief as 24 hours.

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Putin’s game is hypersonic: Is that why we can’t see it?

On Nov. 21, Vladimir Putin presented a huge escalation challenge to the West: are you ready for Russia to strike NATO facilities anywhere in Europe with hypersonic munitions that you don’t possess?

Until Monday, Nov. 18, media outlets brimmed with pro-war activists urging Biden and other Western leaders to free Zelensky’s hand to use longer-range weapons deep inside Russia. Since the summer, bombastic British ex-military saber rattlers have been talking up the decisive impact that Storm Shadow missiles — and by implication, US ATACMS — could make on the battlefield in Kursk, with a range of 300 kilometers or around 185 miles.

They got their wish on Nov. 19, when the first salvo of ATACMS was lobbed at a military facility in Bryansk — outside the area in which Ukrainian forces are battling in Kursk. The following day, British Storm Shadow missiles were fired into Kursk, with the jubilant approval of Prime Minister Keir Starmer, no less. These strikes elicited widespread attaboy jingoism from the Western media, with hardly a word of caution.

However, those who call for the use of deeper strikes into Russian territory fundamentally misunderstand Russian strategy.

I have seen at critical points over the past decade that Russia seeks escalation dominance, a Cold War concept holding that a state can best contain conflicts and avoid escalation if it is dominant at each successive rung up the “ladder of escalation,” all the way to the nuclear rung.

Since the onset of the Ukraine crisis in 2014, Russia has sought to dominate each step up the escalation ladder. The annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 were major escalations that NATO didn’t meet head-on. This strategy is also seen in the diplomatic sphere, for example, Russia escalated a dispute with the U.S. in 2017 when it kicked 755 American diplomatic staff out of Russia. When Moscow over-escalates, it makes a gamble that its adversary will not be willing to step another rung higher on the escalation ladder.

There is a hard-wired view in Moscow, bolstered no doubt by Biden’s incrementalism, that Russia will always overmatch a divided and morally weak Western alliance when push comes to shove. Russia has something that the West does not have — the sovereign power and the political will to act unilaterally. Putin had been subject to criticism from hardliners in Russia that he hasn’t responded to the slow ratcheting up of military support to Ukraine from the West.

As indicated previously, Ukraine receiving permission to use ATACMS deep into Russia would leave Putin with no choice but to respond, having said in September that he would.

So, on Nov. 21, Russia launched a hypersonic Oreshnik missile at a well-fortified Ukrainian weapons facility in Dnipropetrovsk. This is the first time an Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile has been used in combat.

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Russian Politician says Country Possesses ‘Super-Weapon’

On Wednesday Russian Federation Council chairwoman Valentina Matvienko said during a Senate meeting that the country possesses ‘super-weapons’ which can be deployed against the West in a ‘tangible and inevitable response’. The politician did not elaborate on the nature of these super-weapons, although the statement came soon after Russia began using a new ballistic missile system called Oreshnik.

“This is our response to the ongoing escalation by the West and the steps that led to the attack on Russian facilities using long-range weapons. We warn that this is unacceptable,” Matvienko said, according to RT. She said that the use of missiles are a “demonstration that we are ready for any development of events and we have the means, including super-weapons, to give a tangible and inevitable response.” 

She was commenting on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s address to the nation regarding the use of the new Oreshnik hypersonic ballistic missile against a military facility in Ukraine last week.

Interestingly, back on Monday, talkshow host Mike Adams discussed the novel weapons system Russia deployed which he said is a type of checkmate to the conflict.

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What We Know About The New Hypersonic Oreshnik Missile Russia Used Against Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Friday that Moscow would continue testing the hypersonic Oreshnik ballistic missile in “combat conditions” a day after firing one on Ukraine. “We will continue testing this newest system. It is necessary to establish serial production,” he said in a televised meeting with military chiefs.

President Vladimir Putin said on Friday that Russia would keep testing the hypersonic Oreshnik missile it fired at Ukraine a day earlier and begin serial production of the new system.

Putin, in televised comments, said the missile was incapable of being intercepted by an enemy.

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WORLD AT WAR: Surveilling Drones Spotted Near 3 US Air Force Bases in England Last Week

After a week with unprecedented escalations on the war in Ukraine, tensions in Europe are running higher than ever.

Not since the darkest days of the Cold war have Russia and OTAN been so close to open confrontation.

So, it’s not surprising that strange and concerning things are happening in the old continent.

Reports quote the U.S. Air Force as saying that a number of small drones have been detected over last week around three bases in England used by American forces.

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NYC Expands Use Of Drones To Respond To Crimes

The New York Police Department has launched a new program that will send drones zipping to emergency scenes before officers can get there.

Two drones will be stationed at each of five NYPD station houses, including the one that oversees the 843 acres of Manhattan’s iconic Central Park. Three precincts in Brooklyn and one in the Bronx will also be getting the drones as part of the “Drone as First Responder” initiative.

“New York City is flying into the future as we keep New Yorkers safe,” Mayor Eric Adams said in a statement Wednesday. “These drones will mean more efficient policing and will help increase the safety of our responding NYPD officers and New Yorkers.”

The drones will be deployed remotely and programmed to autonomously fly to the exact longitude and latitude of emergencies, including missing-person searches, alerts from the NYPD’s ShotSpotter gunfire detection system and crimes in progress, according to the mayor’s office.

Once a drone arrives at the scene, an NYPD drone pilot at police headquarters in Lower Manhattan or another location will take control of the device. High-resolution cameras equipped with night vision technology and high-definition audio microphones will allow pilots to assess situations and send live feeds to the smartphones of officers and supervisors on the ground.

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Pokémon Go Player Data Being Used to Train AI & Construct ‘Large Geospatial Model’

Millions of users’ location and imaging data is being compiled to construct a global virtual model of the real world, ostensibly to build new augmented reality experiences, the company behind the popular mobile game Pokémon Go has revealed.

In a blog update Tuesday, Niantic explained they’ve been enlisting Pokémon Go players to participate in efforts to construct a Large Geospatial Model (LGM), which the company says “could guide users through the world, answer questions, provide personalized recommendations, help with navigation, and enhance real-world interactions.”

The company says the LGM constructs a comprehensive AI world model by leveraging its Visual Positioning System (VPS), which was “built from user scans, taken from different perspectives and at various times of day, at many times during the years, and with positioning information attached, creating a highly detailed understanding of the world. This data is unique because it is taken from a pedestrian perspective and includes places inaccessible to cars.”

“The LGM will enable computers not only to perceive and understand physical spaces, but also to interact with them in new ways, forming a critical component of AR glasses and fields beyond, including robotics, content creation and autonomous systems,” Niantic said. “As we move from phones to wearable technology linked to the real world, spatial intelligence will become the world’s future operating system.”

“Over the past five years, Niantic has focused on building our Visual Positioning System, which uses a single image from a phone to determine its position and orientation using a 3D map built from people scanning interesting locations in our games and Scaniverse,” the company wrote.

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AI can now create a replica of your personality

Imagine sitting down with an AI model for a spoken two-hour interview. A friendly voice guides you through a conversation that ranges from your childhood, your formative memories, and your career to your thoughts on immigration policy. Not long after, a virtual replica of you is able to embody your values and preferences with stunning accuracy.

That’s now possible, according to a new paper from a team including researchers from Stanford and Google DeepMind, which has been published on arXiv and has not yet been peer-reviewed. 

Led by Joon Sung Park, a Stanford PhD student in computer science, the team recruited 1,000 people who varied by age, gender, race, region, education, and political ideology. They were paid up to $100 for their participation. From interviews with them, the team created agent replicas of those individuals. As a test of how well the agents mimicked their human counterparts, participants did a series of personality tests, social surveys, and logic games, twice each, two weeks apart; then the agents completed the same exercises. The results were 85% similar. 

“If you can have a bunch of small ‘yous’ running around and actually making the decisions that you would have made—that, I think, is ultimately the future,” Park says. 

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Transhumanism, the Death of God, and Eternal War

It seems that the idea of transhumanism as a major force in this current global debacle is often put on the back burner and is considered a bit too extreme to really be taken seriously.

But if I was cornered and asked what I thought the three most significant, and horrifying, elements of this present human challenge were, I would say transhumanism (the destruction of humanity as a group of naturally-made humans), the attempt to kill God, and the waging of eternal war in the world. The primary method used to accomplish all of this is global collectivism.

The assault that all three of these things illustrate essentially boils down to the same basic fundamental endeavour—good vs evil. Good is defined as God’s creation (and if you don’t believe in God, just say “nature’s creation”) and evil is defined as the annihilation of God’s creation (or nature’s creation).

All three of these things stated in the title of this article are activities, profoundly human activities, and are all disguised as some necessary element in sustaining the “good” life. Which is about as ironic as you can get.

Transhumanism is disguised as technological progress in the spirit of maintaining a suffer-less life and extending that life as long as possible—improving on a fundamentally faulty creation. The death of God (of course no one or thing can “kill” God, but you know what I mean) is necessary for self-preservation (physical life).

God restricts us, or so they say, and it is inhuman to be beholding to any sort of powerful entity (assuming that God actually fits that limited definition). So clearly God (or the concept of God) must be destroyed if man is to take His place creating medical advancement to avoid the single thing a material human fears the most—death.

Destroying God creates at the same time the notion that physical life is the end-all of existence and that without God we are free to be God and create technology that knows how to sustain life better than God ever did, or ever will.

Never-ending war is more of a current technicality than a philosophical necessity. War is presently necessary to keep the fear of death alive, which is necessary to keep the techno-medical wheels turning, which is necessary to keep the desperation for never-ending life and physical “safety” alive.

War can be a variety of things, it can be the old-fashioned sort of war where men and women run around in open fields and get shot at or blown up in a variety of ways, or it can be the war of disease through pandemics, cancers, poisons a person eats, drinks, is jabbed with, or breathes. War of these sorts creates fears, which creates efforts to stay alive and safe, which creates compliance to the World Order which is calling the shots—no pun intended.

See how smoothly all of this works?

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