catileptic

catileptic, 4 months ago to random

Police in RO strip-searched and collected the fingerprints of a female activist.

She had previously posted a picture on Facebook of a police person with their gun drawn, pointing at a civilian car, during a peaceful protest.

The chief of police said they performed similar actions in the case of 24 other messages distributed in social media, that "instigated to violence" in the context of ongoing farmers' and agricultural workers' protests.

https://www.hotnews.ro/stiri-esential-26825021-24-dosare-penale-pentru-instigare-timpul-protestelor-transportatorilor-spune-seful-politiei-romane-cazul-protestatarei-ridicate-dupa-mesaj-facebook.htm

catileptic, 5 months ago to random

The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) is looking to hire a Digital Rights Research Lead!

https://birn.eu.com/vacancies/vacancy-call-digital-rights-research-lead/

Deadline: January 22.

catileptic, 5 months ago to random

Reminding everyone that we have a cybersecurity law in Romania, that has been declared constitutional (ffs!), that allows a handful of gov. institutions to ask cybersecurity services providers for client data related to vulnerabilities and incidents.

The data reported back to these institutions must not include personal or content data - lol.

Otherwise, freelancers & companies risk a pretty hefty fine (5.000-50.000 RON).

catileptic, 5 months ago to random

"The perfect language model lets us navigate the infinite collection of plausible texts by simply typing their first words, but nothing tells the true from the false, the helpful from the misleading, the right from the wrong."

https://arxiv.org/abs/2310.01425

The paper draws parallels between Borges' Library of Babel and LLMs. The metaphor of the Library turns out to be a good fit for explaining how LLMs fall short of the task we want them to fulfill, while fulfilling an altogether different one. (1/2)

catileptic, 5 months ago to random

folx around me started playing idle games independently of each other so i am also now replaying the kitten idle game ( https://kittensgame.com/web/ )

does anyone have recommendations for good / fun / interesting idle games?

something with no ads in it, please <3

#idlegames

einalex, 5 months ago to random

#37c3 Relationship Geek Get Together • Day 3 • 18:00 • Stage Y • de/en • Let's hang out and talk about #polyamory , #relationshipanarchy and #enm https://events.ccc.de/congress/2023/hub/en/event/relationship-geeks-get-together/

catileptic, 5 months ago to random

Excellent year-in-review by @LaQuadrature at #37c3 !

The French government is amping up public surveillance, and the tech industry profits. Spyware is being used, and the Constitutional court only disproves of a small part of its feature set.

Worst for last: the December 8 case may set a legal precent for equating the use of encryption with clandestine behaviour and terrorist plotting.

@LaQuadrature posted their slides & context on Mastodon, and the video is soon to come.

catileptic, 5 months ago to random

Excited for my first Congress!

I would have brought stickers, but the self-printed ones I brought to camp ended up smudging. Seems like I didn't get the combination of paper and ink right.

If anyone has tips & tricks about a solid combination of sticker paper and printer ink / printer type, let me know.

Looking forwards to the chaos <3

#37C3

catileptic, 6 months ago to random

The case that the Romanian journalist Emilia Șercan opened, for being threatened the day after she published proof of the plagiarism of prime-minister Nicolae Ciucă, will stay open, in spite of the attempts to close it.

The Public Prosecutor's Office tried to drop the prosecution "because it is not in the public interest". However, the Court decided to reject dropping the case.

https://www.libertatea.ro/stiri/dosarul-amenintarii-emiliei-sercan-nu-va-fi-inchis-jurnalista-a-castigat-in-instanta-dupa-ce-parchetul-renuntase-la-urmarirea-penala-pentru-ca-nu-prezinta-interes-public-4733561

catileptic, 6 months ago to random

great read by Brett Scott in Aeon about the dangers of a cashless society. what a cashless system would look like is pretty interesting in itself, but i found Scott's explanation of how different narratives from the Left are re-purposed by the Right to be a very useful mapping.

also, the final metaphor in the piece, about why we use preserve and encourage the possibility to use cash is so on point!

https://aeon.co/essays/going-cashless-is-a-bad-idea-but-its-not-a-conspiracy

catileptic, 7 months ago to random

The ultra-nationalist, extremist Romanian political party AUR published a list of demands on the day when Romanians celebrate their national army, Oct 25. One of the demands is straight-up #eugenics:

The political class needs to "Support the Natural Family which is formed by a man and a woman and consolidate the healthy biological gene pool of the Romanian Nation".

News coverage: https://romania.europalibera.org/a/armata-aur-sute-de-ofiteri-si-generali-susin-un-apel-de-nationalizare-si-limitare-a-drepturilor/32665619.html

Public declaration: https://partidulaur.ro/mircia-chelaru-declaratie-de-presa-cadrele-militare-in-rezerva-si-retragere-din-armata-romaniei/

catileptic, 7 months ago to random

The Romanian justice system legalizes the kompromat.

The Bucharest Court of Appeal closed a file on the #kompromat operation against journalist Emilia Șercan.

We saw reasonable suspicion that people in the Romanian Police had leaked evidence from the file and also fabricated evidence to hide these illegalities.

Yet, the case was closed. As was another case for direct threat, opened by Șercan.

In 2022, Șercan proved that the (then) PM Nicolae Ciucă had plagiarized his PhD thesis.

catileptic, 7 months ago to random

i reinstalled IG because i noticed there were new accounts in Romania doing activism and i wanted to read their content. but..

my feed was alternating accounts i never chose to follow with the ones i did. sometimes it was hard, mid-scroll, to tell which is which.

after a week of consuming it, my anxiety spiked to such an extent that i uninstalled the app.

waiting for the #DSA implementation that allows us to chose the algorithm used by our feed. "chronological, follow-only" would be great!

catileptic, 7 months ago to random

NSO Group and Candiru are said to have been asked by the Israeli government to upgrade their software capabilities and join in the s/war/genocide efforts.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-26/israel-taps-blacklisted-pegasus-maker-nso-to-track-gaza-hostages-and-hamas

The thing we will also have to contend with, later on, is spyware upgraded under the "anything goes" state-approved kind of pressure, continuing to function with impunity.

catileptic, 7 months ago to random

I came across a google search for "african countries that start with k" and the feature snippet says <<While there are 54 recognized countries in Africa, none of them begin with the letter "K". The closest is Kenya, which starts with a "K" sound, but is actually spelled with a "K" sound. It's always interesting to learn new trivia facts like this.>>

Weird, right?

It seems like it's coming from an answer ChatGPT gave, based on the fact that it comes from emergentmint dot com.

1/2

catileptic, 7 months ago to random

#ActiveWatch, the Romanian media watchdog organization, writes about investigative journalists and their sources in the fifth edition of FreeEx Digest.

Romanian journalists lay out their personal principles and good practices when talking to and working with sources.

An interesting thread that runs through their answers is the distinction between sources and whistleblowers.

What their answers have in common is the pledge to protect sources, no matter what.

https://activewatch.ro/articole/jurnalistii-si-sursele-lor-freeex-digest-nr-5/

catileptic, 7 months ago to random

@Bellingcat notes the inconsistencies in the statement by the Israel Defense Forces, which claims that the explosion at the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza City that killed hundred of people "came from inside Gaza".

The IDF initially claimed there was no crater on site. A day later, an IDF spokesperson admites that there is a crater, but it's too small to be caused by Israeli munition. "If a big Israeli bomb had been dropped here, none of this would have been intact."

https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2023/10/18/identifying-possible-crater-from-gaza-hospital-blast/

catileptic, 8 months ago to random

#amnestyinternational: "Israel/OPT: Civilians on both sides paying the price of unprecedented escalation in hostilities between Israel and Gaza as death toll mounts"

I have no solidarity with the Israeli state, not with the same state that has already committed war crimes in Palestinian territories. Also, same state that approved invasive spyware for sale to oppressive, authoritarian regimes, and facilitated numerous attacks on activists and journalists.

Solidarity is for civilians only.

catileptic, 8 months ago to random

The ultra-nationalist (fascist) Romanian political party, AUR, distributed leaflets to students in the university of Political Studies in Bucharest. The party encourages students to drop out of university and join the party.

The head of the party declared that he backs up everything that was written in the leaflets.

An INSCOP survey gives the head of AUR a 18.7% chance of winning the presidential elections next year.