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Comment by akerro | Hacker News Reader

Why does facebook and google feel entitled to fight "Russian activity"? What if most of that "Russian" activity is created by CIA/NSA and European SIGINT agencies that we know (from Vault7) stole others fingerprints and can pretend to act as other actors? Should not facebook and google stay neutral on political issues, unless it affects their business?

Facebook was actively supporting republicans campaigns in the last US presidential elections, what if all that Russian spying and hacking is just a revenge on republicans lost?

How and why can we trust US businesses to act in a neutral manner?

https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/mar/07/wikileaks-cia-...

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> stole others fingerprints

IOCs don't really work that way. It's pretty unlikely that FireEye, et. al. would be fooled by copypasta binaries.

But there is an interesting point related to this: US corporations are clearly going to the mat for their host country's intelligence services. Note this in the context of the dozen(s?) of cases of foreign election interference the CIA has been involved in.

I don't think there's any doubt that Russia interfered with the US election. But I do find it interesting that GooFaceAmaSoft are deafeningly silent on the transparency or policing of their host country's own psyops.

What's the principle here? Is it that we don't want agencies of foreign governments interfering by way of communications in US politics?

Which of the following is ok or not ok:

1. FSB running a team posting to facebook/twitter/reddit to influence US politics.

2. Gazprom running a team posting to facebook/twitter/reddit to influence US politics.

3. Russia Today putting out stories to influence US politics.

4. John Oliver being part of a team putting out a weekly TV show to influence US politics.

5. The Independent in the UK putting out stories to influence US politics.

6. Illegal immigrants marching in the streets to influence US politics.

7. Numerous foreign governments, heads of state, foreign press putting out stories to influence US politics regarding the Paris Agreement.

E: I remember in 2008 shortly after the Citizens United decision NPR spent a morning relating all the horribles that will come from it, such as foreign businesses being involved in US politics by way of funding media. The very next day they did a positively colored human interest story about a Mexican immigrant, in the US illegally, going door to door stumping for local politicians and the Democratic party. It created in my mind the question of whether the problem is rich people influencing politics or foreign people influencing politics.

The only principle I'm discussing here is that of consistency.

We interfere fairly regularly in other sovereign states' elections, and then act shocked that a foreign power does it to us.

We should either:

1. NOT conduct influence ops against sovereigns, and crack down on ops against us.

2. DO conduct influence ops against sovereigns, but fully expect to be repaid in kind.

Any other option is highly hypocritical. I believe that if FB et. al. get into the business of policing foreign influence operations, they should police them ALL.

> don't think there's any doubt that Russia interfered with the US election

I see nothing wrong with this. We have +180 confirmed elections interfered by US agencies. None of them was reported in mainstream media. What's wrong with it being the other way around?

This sounds like something you'd read on Infowars.

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