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WikiLeaks Threatens To Publish Twitter Users' Personal Info (usatoday.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the surveillance-purposes dept.

WikiLeaks said on Twitter earlier today that it wants to publish the private information of hundreds of thousands of verified Twitter users. The group said an online database would include such sensitive details as family relationships and finances. USA Today reports: "We are thinking of making an online database with all 'verified' twitter accounts [and] their family/job/financial/housing relationships," the WikiLeaks Task Force account tweeted Friday. The account then tweeted: "We are looking for clear discrete (father/shareholding/party membership) variables that can be put into our AI software. Other suggestions?" Wikileaks told journalist Kevin Collier on Twitter that the organization wants to "develop a metric to understand influence networks based on proximity graphs." Twitter bans the use of Twitter data for "surveillance purposes." In a statement, Twitter said: "Posting another person's private and confidential information is a violation of the Twitter rules." Twitter declined to say how many of its users have verified accounts but the Verified Twitter account which follows verified accounts currently follows 237,000. Verified accounts confirm the identity of the person tweeting by displaying a blue check mark. Twitter says it verifies an account when "it is determined to be an account of public interest." Twitter launched the feature in 2009 after celebrities complained about people impersonating them on the social media service.

15 of 211 comments (clear)

  1. Wikileaks by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Oh do please tell us, all you Wikileaks supporters, just how wonderful an organization it is, as it begins the process of trying to fuck over hundreds of thousands of people whose only crime was verifying their account.

    --
    The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    1. Re:Wikileaks by Luthair · · Score: 5, Insightful

      WikiLeaks originally looked like it could become one of the important institutions for government transparency and institutional crime, however they seemed to have ended up largely as an group looking to self-aggrandize their reputation. At this point they seem to be irrelevant, the important leaks like Snowden, Panama Papers, Swiss banking, etc. have not used them.

    2. Re:Wikileaks by MightyMartian · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I was a supporter when they were releasing information in a non-partisan and unbiased way. Now that they're basically a tool of the Russian government, and possibly of even worse actors, I think the time has come to write them off.

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    3. Re:Wikileaks by Augusto · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I've been on slashdot a looooong time. Never supported wikileaks, and Assange seemed like an asshole from day 1.

      --

      - sigs are for wimps.
    4. Re:Wikileaks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      "I was a supporter when they released leaks against the Bush administration. As soon as they went after Obama and Clinton I hated them and they're Russian propaganda agents."

      FTFY you half-wit tool.

    5. Re:Wikileaks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      I was a supporter when they were releasing information in a non-partisan and unbiased way. Now that they're basically a tool of the Russian government, and possibly of even worse actors, I think the time has come to write them off.

      Says a known paid tool (with shameful history of comments with falsehoods and slanders) of corrupt war mongering mass murderer Clinton.
      In contrast nothing that comes from Wikileaks have been proven wrong.

    6. Re:Wikileaks by helsinki92 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Personal emails are not something different when you are using your personal email address for government business!

    7. Re:Wikileaks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      This comment is clearly trolling/flaimbait, yet it's been moderated as +4 informative and +1 insightful. We need more people metamoderating to prevent this shit from getting any worse.

    8. Re:Wikileaks by Smidge204 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Wikileaks does not wish to dox anyone. They wish to create a database of influence.

      So all those rape victims and mental health patients they doxxed last August were all influential politicos?
      =Smidge=

  2. on one hand, it's sleazy. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    But on the other, if you give Twitter your personal information such as name and family relationships, what did you think was going to happen? It's too tempting of a target. People need to start saying "no" to social media companies that want to harvest every shred of personal information about them.

    Use them pseudonymously if you must, but do not let them have that much data about you. It's a recipe for disaster.

  3. Four legs good, two legs BETTER. by T.E.D. · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Originally, I believe the idea of Wikileaks was to have a place for people to safely and anonymously without fear of retaliation, leak information people in power didn't want publicized.

    Now in the last day, Wikileaks has come out against government leaks, and anonymity, and in support of retaliation against people (eg: Doxing). In our own little real-life version of Animal Farm, it looks like we're now near the end of the story.

    Or like @ElliotHiggins said on Twitter:

    Feels like WikiLeaks stared into the abyss, then fell into it, befriended the monsters, and is now looking upwards with them.

  4. Re:Ironic much? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The don't want to find the identity of the verified person.

    They want to know where they work.

    They want to know where they live.

    They want to know who their loved ones are.

    They want to know where their loved ones work and live.

    What better way to keep someone in check than to send them a photo of where their spouse works or where their child goes to school?

    Not to mention they are really bad at it - they replied to a guy making fun of them and linked his LinkedIn profile to taunt him saying he spent 10 years in Government. Except they didn't post his linkedin. He has his linkedin page one degree of separation from the personal URL on his twitter profile. They picked out a guy with a similar name. Good job.

  5. The sooner the better.. by fluffernutter · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Not that this is a good thing, but I see a silver lining. The sooner the general public realizes how stupid it is to give these companies their private information the better. Maybe then the internet can move past this phase and become more useful and less creepy.

    --
    Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
  6. It's a pretty safe bet... by hyades1 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...that Trump and his kids will somehow escape scrutiny.

    --
    I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
  7. Re:Where is the burden of proof again? by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Um... All I pointed out was that they have only seen the part of the report that was unclassified, all the evidence is in the non-public classified part that Trump has seen. Even Trump seems to be accepting that evidence, just not that it had any influence over his victory.

    Clearly, since the GP hasn't seen the classified report, making the conclusions they did is not warranted.

    Also, verbal abuse of whites? You are hallucinating again. Whoever you think I am, I'm not.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC