Facebook: High School Science Club Management in Action
September 3, 2020
The online information service Mashable published a headline which tells the story. And the story is a Dusie if accurate: “Mark Zuckerberg Blames Facebook Contractors for Kenosha Militia Fiasco.” The article states:
When it comes to mistakenly allowing a militia’s event page to remain on Facebook, even after concerned users reported it at least 455 times, Mark Zuckerberg wants you to know that the buck stops with his contractors.
The essence of the high school science club management method is to infuse entitlement and arrogance with a pinch of denial. The write up notes:
According to Zuckerberg, the reason Facebook chose to tacitly approve an event page that, by his own admission, violated the site’s own rules, is because the non-Facebook employees tasked with enforcing his company’s Byzantine policies didn’t understand them well enough.
The HSSC approach to management may be institutionalized in some Silicon Valley type outfits. That’s super, right? The elite science club is never wrong; for example, “It is not our fault that the stink bomb triggered smoke alarms and two students were hurt rushing from the building.”
Stephen E Arnold, September 3, 2020
Smart Software: Automating Duplicitous Behavior
August 31, 2020
Dark patterns in software can be found. What about dark patterns in artificial intelligence libraries and apps? The problem is likely to be difficult if not impossible, particularly if those trying to figure out the AI’s process are not well informed.
“All That Glitters Is Not Gold: Misuse of AI by Big Tech Can Harm Developing Countries” provides some information into a facet of smart software not often considered by users, API users, or regulators. The write up states:
The biggest concern with AI is a lack of governance, which gives large companies (popularly called as the “Big Tech”) unlimited access to private data.
That’s a safe statement. The write up continues:
In his study, Dr, Truby [Qatar University] discusses three examples to show how unregulated AI can be detrimental to SDGs. To begin with, he focuses on SDG 16, a goal that was developed to tackle corruption, organized crime, and terrorism. He explains that because AI is commonly used in national security databases, it can be misused by criminals to launder money or organize crime. This is especially relevant in developing countries, where input data may be easily accessible because of poor protective measures. Dr Truby suggests that, to prevent this, there should be a risk assessment at each stage of AI development. Moreover, the AI software should be designed such that it is inaccessible when there is a threat of it being hacked. Such restrictions can minimize the risk of hackers obtaining access to the software.
According to the write up, Dr. Truby asserts:
He concludes, “The risks of AI to the society and the possible detriments to sustainable development can be severe if not managed correctly. On the flip side, regulating AI can be immensely beneficial to development, leading to people being more productive and more satisfied with their employment and opportunities.”
Scrutiny is likely in some countries. In others, the attitude is, “How are my investments doing today?”
Stephen E Arnold, August 31, 2020
Hippy Dippy New Age Insight: Ads Are Numerous
July 30, 2020
I want to keep this brief. The number of ads is increasing. Avoiding them is difficult. Why? Zero controls, zero social responsibility, and zero regulatory oversight.
“I Was Horrified at How Many Ads the New Brave Browser and VPN for iOS Blocked” is amusing because it reveals the lack of awareness of the zip zip mobile world in which some hippy dippy New Age “real” news publications thrive.
The article states:
I visited a few of my favorite sites and then was promptly horrified when it told me that in about 3 minutes of browsing, it had blocked 107 ads and trackers and given me 2 HTTPS upgrades. Supposedly, this saved me five seconds of my life.
Not for long. Online advertisers share some DNA with bad actors creating novel malware. One difference: Law enforcement pursues the malware wizards. Online advertising outfits get invited to testify to a Congressional committee.
Stephen E Arnold, July 30, 2020
High Schoolers: The Cafeteria Jibes Continue
July 7, 2020
I read “What’s Really Behind Tech Versus Journalism?” The write up’s goal is to explain that the Silicon Valley crowd is not happy with “real” journalists.
The article asserts:
Let me start with a brief recounting of events — and acknowledge that I played a role in some of them.
Okay, an autobiographical account of the origin of the high school cafeteria spat. The combatants are the whiz kids in Science Club. This is the organization which may have served as the inspiration for the film “Revenge of the Nerds.”
At the other table in the lunch room are the writers, the wordsmiths able to melt the hearts of English teachers and inflame the school’s administration with poems, pamphlets, and pulsing pellets of prose.
Now the two factions are grown up. The science club crowd wants to do what it wants. That’s the move fast, break stuff group informed by its interpretation of the smartest people in the room.
The pulsing pellets of prose group wants to right wrongs. That’s the we know better than you faction. Those required readings provide the tinder for burning outrage.
As adults, the members of these groups no longer skirmish in the close confines of an 18 minute lunch break for hyper active teenyboppers. The battle is on a bigger stage. The science club members have done bad things. The pellets of prose crowd becomes the target for the anger of the whiz kids. Confusion and chaos ensue. After 20 years of doing whatever, the science club folks want their status quo to remain, well, static.
The prose pellet pals want the wrongs of the science club fixed and fast. I can hear the taunts grinding in the background.
The write up reports:
Workers still face significant obstacles as they lobby to create more fair and equitable workplaces.
The notion of “workplaces” seems quaint, almost old-fashioned. That’s just one of the oddities in the write up. Add that pre-Covid stance to the autobiographical spin.
The administrators get involved. And who may these respected individuals be? Venture capitalists, the skin in the game crowd, the MBA torpedoes blasting their way through mere social norms:
Certainly, the worlds of tech and venture capital have complaints about journalism that go beyond hit pieces. … The exasperation is real, even if the scrutiny is a natural consequence of starting a company that aims to change the world.
Let’s step back.
I have used the phrase “high school science club management methods” to describe the approach to governance evidenced among some of the high-tech, high-performance companies. The HSSCMM — which one upscale, bug buck “real” journalist did not understand when I explained the concept — is one way to approach decisions which have unintended consequences; for example, Facebook and its dealings with those involved in the Cambridge Analytica matter. As I recall, exactly zero changed at Facebook. Also, there’s innovation starved companies like Google buying an obscure maker of semi functional Google Glass devices. I can almost hear the inner voices of Googlers whispering, “We are behind, we are behind. Buy the company, buy the company.” Will this deal be a Dodgeball II reprise.
The “real” journalists, for their part are wordsmiths. The idea the pen is mightier than the checkbook lives on.
The dispute is one more example of how one faction of high school achievers responds to another faction. The issues require more than jibes, knee jerk reactions, and “I told you” so’s.
That’s one of the consequences of allowing a particular mind set make decisions because of this rationale: “We can just do it. So there.”
Both the technology wizards from the science club and the wordsmiths from the writing club see themselves as informed individuals. Both in their view are “right,” which is a nebulous concept in a relativistic world of dynamic data.
The problem from my point of view is that these views emerged fully formed from a 15-year-old brains, were refined by conversations with fellow travelers, and encouraged by those who could make money from these young achievers.
After decades of ministrations by nurturing venture capitalists, what have we got? A food fight, but is a food fight is not what’s needed to address significant issues about governance, ethical behavior, and professional conduct.
Net net: Watch out. That angry teen just threw a Twinkie at the principal.
Stephen E Arnold, July 7, 2020
Quote to Note: A Father of the Internet and a Googler to Boot
July 7, 2020
DarkCyber spotted this quote from Vint Cerf. I once introduced him at a conference and he displayed a T shirt with the message “I TCP on Everything!”
Here’s the Cerf quote from Diginomica:
When you see a phenomenon like the Internet, which is rich in its evolution, new ideas, new applications, it is a very open architecture and invites people to invent new ways of using it. But this introduces new kinds of governance concerns: what we do about misinformation, about malware which is propagating through the network, about someone in one country who is harmed by someone in another. For anyone who is interested in governance, there is simply a wide open space here for hard work and for international agreements, in order to manage this very complex and very rich environment that we call the Internet, and the World Wide Web.
Interesting phrasing. We noted the words misinformation, malware, and governance.
Governance is particularly interesting; for example, what does governance mean in this sentence:
But this introduces new kinds of governance concerns.
Yes, that is true if the quote is accurate. If any company knows anything about governance, I would submit it is the Google.
Stephen E Arnold, July 7, 2020
Techno-Grousing: A New Analytic Method?
July 3, 2020
Two items snagged my attention as my team and I were finishing the pre-recorded lecture about Amazon policeware for the upcoming National Cyber Crime Conference.
The first is a mostly context free item from a Silicon Valley type “real” news outfit. The article’s title is:
Hany Farid Says a Reckoning Is Coming for Toxic Social Media
The item comes from one of the technology emission centers in the San Francisco / Silicon Valley region: A professor at the University of California, Berkeley.
What’s interesting is that Hany Farid is activating a klaxon that hoots:
In five years, I expect us to have long since reached the boiling point that leads to reining in an almost entirely unregulated technology sector to contend with how technology has been weaponized against individuals, society, and democracy.
Insight? Prediction? Anticipatory avoidance?
After decades of supporting, advocating, and cheerleading technology — now, this moment, is the time to be aware that change is coming. Who is responsible? The media is a candidate, people who disseminate misinformation, and bad actors.
Sounds good. What about educators? Well, not mentioned.
The other item comes from the Jakarta Post. You can find the story at this link. I have learned that mentioning the entity the story discusses results in my blog post being skipped by certain indexing systems. Hey, that’s a surprise, right?
The point of the write up is that a certain social media site is now struggling with increased feistiness among otherwise PR influenced users.
What’s interesting is that suddenly, like the insight du jour from the Berkeley professor, nastiness is determined to be undesirable.
The fix for the social media outfit is simple: Get out of line and you will be blocked from the service. There’s nothing so comforting as hitting the big red cancel button.
Turning battleships quickly can have interesting consequences. The question is, “What if the battleship’s turn has unforeseen consequences?”
Stephen E Arnold, July 3, 2020
MIT and Being Smart
July 3, 2020
When I hear “MIT”, I think Jeffrey Epstein. Sorry. Imprinting at work. I read “MIT Apologizes, Permanently Pulls Offline Huge Dataset That Taught AI Systems to Use Racist, Misogynistic Slurs.” Yep, that the MIT which trains smart people today.
The write up reports:
Vinay Prabhu, chief scientist at UnifyID, a privacy startup in Silicon Valley, and Abeba Birhane, a PhD candidate at University College Dublin in Ireland, pored over the MIT database and discovered thousands of images labeled with racist slurs for Black and Asian people, and derogatory terms used to describe women. They revealed their findings in a paper undergoing peer review for the 2021 Workshop on Applications of Computer Vision conference.
Presumably the demise of Mr. Epstein prevented him from scrutinizing the dataset for appropriate candidates.
Error corrected. Apology emitted. Another outstanding example of academic excellence engraved in digital history.
Stephen E Arnold, July 3, 2020
Governance, Data Management, Digital Revolution! Yeah, Right
May 29, 2020
The digital revolution is not going as planned if the information in a recent Beta News’ article is correct. The headline tells the tale:
Three Quarters of Organizations Fail to Complete Legacy System Modernizations.
The statement is surprising to DarkCyber. The write up explains:
New research from Advanced shows that 74 percent of organizations have started a legacy system modernization project but failed to complete it.
Plus there is more:
The report also suggests a disconnect between business and technical teams could be to blame. CIOs and heads of IT are more interested in the technology landscape of their organization as a whole, whereas enterprise architects are more internally focused.
How does one complete modernization projects? Wave a magic wand? Hire retired people who built the system? Use a mobile app? Organize via Microsoft Teams? Hold Zoom meetings? No, the answer is:
“Collaboration is absolutely essential to successful modernization,” says Brandon Edenfield, managing director of application modernization at Advanced. “To achieve this, technical teams must ensure that senior leadership see the value and broader business impact of these efforts in terms they can understand. Without full commitment and buy-in from the C-Suite, these projects run the risk of complete failure.”
DarkCyber wishes to offer a handful of observations. You may interpret these as reasons for dead end digital renovations:
- Cost. The estimates are incorrect and the bean counters choke off funds.
- Complexity. The 20 somethings and the MBAs afflicted with spreadsheet fever have under estimated how difficult the rework actually is.
- Craziness. The manager with the bright idea leaves or gets fired and in the chaotic aftermath, the project goes away.
Yep, the three Cs and probably the reason for the dismal performance of the modern data management, governance, and digital revolution in most companies. Change is somewhat more difficult that some people armed with PowerPoints and consulting babble wish to know.
Stephen E Arnold, May 29, 2020
Google: App Quality Control?
May 21, 2020
It appears APT group OceanLotus, believed to originate in Vietnam, managed to play Google Play and other app marketplaces for half a decade. DarkReading reports, “5-Year-Long Cyber Espionage Campaign Hid in Google Play.” The attack campaign, dubbed “PhantomLance” by Kaspersky and called “Operation Oceanmobile” by BlackBerry researchers, mainly targeted Android users in Southeast Asia. The malware managed to evade detection in part by changing up its code over time. BlackBerry published their investigation last October, while Kaspersky recently revealed new details. The malicious code was hidden in utility apps like ad blockers, Flash plug-ins, and cache cleaners as well as (interestingly) Vietnamese apps for finding local churches and bars. Writer Kelly Jackson Higgins cites Kaspersky researcher Alexey Firsh:
“Firsh says he and his team decided to dig deeper into a Trojan backdoor that was first revealed in a July 2019 report by researchers at Dr. Web. The relatively unusual backdoor, they found, dated back to at least December 2015, the registration date of one of the domains used in the campaign, according to Firsh. The latest sample of the spying malware was present in apps on Google Play in November 2019, he says, when Kaspersky notified Google. … The attackers created several versions of the backdoor, with dozens of samples, and when an app first went up in Google Play or other app stores, it didn’t contain malware: That was added later in the form of an update, after the user had installed it.”
Sneaky. The attackers also used different encryption keys and separate infrastructures. They even went to the trouble of writing realistic privacy policies for each app, maintaining customer service emails addresses where they actually answered questions, and creating a fake developer profile on GitHub to look legit. Higgins explains what the software was up to:
“The malware performs the usual spy stuff, gathering geolocation information, call logs, contact lists, and SMS messages, as well as information on the victim’s device, such as model, operating system, and installed apps. ‘But we see that it also has the ability to execute special shell commands from the [C2] server and download additional payloads on the victim’s device,’ Firsh explains.”
Also known as APT32, OceanLotus has targeted Vietnamese dissidents, journalists, and other citizens as well as industries in China, the Philippines, Germany, the UK, and the US.
Cynthia Murrell, May 21, 2020
Harvard Channels MIT: Academic Funding Magnetism
May 20, 2020
The study of mathematical principles that guide evolution is a fascinating field, and Harvard’s Program for Evolutionary Dynamics is a worthy research and teaching program. Its goals include, among others, finding cures for cancer and for infectious diseases. Unfortunately, like many poised in an ivory tower, its director seems to have been afflicted with greed. The Harvard Crimson Reveals, “FAS Places Prof. Nowak on Leave after Report Finds Epstein Used His Program to Rehabilitate Image.” Reporter James S. Bikales writes:
“A University report found Epstein attempted to use Harvard and the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics, which Nowak directs, as a tool to rehabilitate his image following his 2008 conviction for solicitation of minors for prostitution. Epstein likely made more than 40 visits to PED’s offices at One Brattle Square between 2010 and 2018, according to the report, which also states that Nowak approved the posting of flattering and false descriptions of Epstein’s philanthropy and support of Harvard on the PED website.”
Though no evidence was found that donations from the (alleged) underage-sex-ring facilitator and serial abuser were accepted after his conviction, he had donated millions to the PED in the recent past. Epstein also helped facilitate a John Templeton Foundation grant to the program in 2015, which was accepted. Certain pre-conviction perks were also supplied to the convict-to-be, including a fellowship he was unqualified for and an office complete with keycode access to the PED building. There is no evidence Epstein interacted with students during his approximately 40 visits, aside from sitting in on one undergrad math class.
While awaiting trial on federal charges of trafficking and sexually assaulting at least 80 underage girls, Epstein died in August 2019 in his prison cell. Though likely to be less dramatic, Nowak’s fate is still to be decided pending an investigation.
Cynthia Murrell, May 20, 2020
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