Wednesday, July 22, 2020

China Malware: Guarding against disinformation.

CHINA SYNDROME:  Malware stashed in China-mandated software is more extensive than thought.


Australia has expressed alarm over Chinese hackers compromising networks across the world for commercial and personal gain, after a US Justice Department indictment alleged a decade-long spree targeting an Australian defence contractor, the personal data of Hong Kong protesters and COVID-19 vaccine researchers.

The joint-statement from the Department of Foreign Affairs, Department of Home Affairs and the Australian Signals Directorate on Wednesday follows rising animosity between China and Australia's Five Eyes partners, including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and New Zealand over the coronavirus crisis, Hong Kong and a military build-up in the South China Sea.

Australia hits out at Chinese hackers, as Pompeo urges global coalition against China



Watch out for COVID-19 hoaxes that suggest technologies misuse your personal data 



. . . technology

  • Research by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism found that 21% of conversations on Twitter about COVID-19 or the World Health Organization were toxic.
    • The study defined toxic conversations as, “a rude, disrespectful, or unreasonable comment that is likely to make people leave a discussion.”
    • Study authors said more research was needed to determine the causes of toxicity and their impact on public opinions.
  • CNN’s Marshall Cohen looked at why Twitter in late May labeled President Donald Trump’s tweets about mail-in voting as potentially misleading but has not put labels on more recent tweetsthat appear to be similarly misleading.
    • “The distinction Twitter is drawing is that there’s a difference between questioning the integrity of mail-in voting as a broad concept, versus suggesting that voting procedures in a particular state are fraudulent,” Cohen wrote. He said the platform’s approach creates a “strange dynamic.”

. . . politics

  • The Washington Post reported that its catalog of falsehoods from President Trump reached the 20,000 mark as of July 9. The newest numbers, the Post reported, show an average of 23 false claims a day over the past 14 months.
    • The coronavirus pandemic has “spawned a whole new genre of Trump’s falsehoods,” the Post’s fact-checkers wrote.
  • Doctors at Brazil’s public hospitals say they’re being pressured to hand out hydroxychloroquine, Bloomberg News reported, amid debates about the drug’s efficacy against COVID-19.

. . . science and health

  • A doctor in Michigan wrote for HuffPostthat she sees the need for a new diagnostic code: Misinformation. Asha Shajahan, a primary care physician at Beaumont Health, said that she does myth-busting during nearly 90% of her video visits.
  • Kaiser Health News’ Julie Appleby has a good explainer on COVID-19 contact tracing, the subject of many conspiracy theories, and how it works.
    • “Misinformation abounds, from tales that people who talk to contact tracers will be sent to nonexistent ‘FEMA camps’ — a rumor so prevalent that health officials in Washington state had to put out a statement in May debunking it — to elaborate theories that the efforts are somehow part of a plot by global elites, such as the Clinton Foundation, Bill Gates or George Soros,” she wrote.

This week, LeadStoriesdebunked multiple false claims about COVID-19 that popped up in a video made by Colorado physician Dr. Kelly Victory. The fact-check broke the video down chronologically, quoting Victory and linking to the timecode of each false claim.

Some of the claims included a false assertion that COVID-19 can’t survive warm temperatures, that young people aren’t impacted by the virus and that social distancing is not an established health care practice.

For her warm temperature claim, LeadStories linked to a World Health Organization mythbuster page that showed even warm weather countries are seeing outbreaks of the virus. For the claim about young people, LeadStories spoke to the director of Hawaii’s COVID-19 response who noted the high number of 30-year-olds contracting the virus. For the claim about social distancing, LeadStories linked to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention article about using social distancing to protect former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.

What we liked: This fact-check not only breaks down Victory’s multiple claims one-by-one, but enables the reader to evaluate her claims for themselves by using timecode links to the original video. It’s also a lesson in how readers need to be aware of a source’s expertise; much of her advice is contrasted with guidance from recognized medical experts and peer-reviewed articles.

– Harrison Mantas, IFCN


  1. The New York Timesreported on criticisms of Facebook’s approach to climate change disinformation.  
  2. In a press release Monday, the BBC announced that along with its fellow members of the Trusted News Initiative it would begin adding a digital watermark to its content to guard against disinformation. 
  3. Reuters reported that a British university student who wrote opinion columns critical of anti-Israeli surveillance activists was a fictional persona, and his photo was the product of deepfake technology. 
  4. Indian newswire IANS reported that Google will cooperate with South Korean authorities to monitor and combat the spread of misinformation on YouTube. 
  5. The Union of Concerned Scientists put out a guide to spotting and stopping COVID-19 disinformation. 

A clarification from last week: An item in Quick Hits said that a flaw in SmartNews’ algorithm may have contributed to misinformation on Facebook about alleged antifa raids in southern Oregon. SmartNews points out that it was a flaw in the algorithm it uses to acquire new users, not the algorithm that determines how it distributes news.

Via 

Susan and Harrison



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