The Packet Rat

Two years ago, I gave a presentation at a little gathering we like to call ThruntCon entitled “Everything you need to know about the inevitable collapse of journalism as we know it.” For reference, these are the slides I spoke to in that talk:

That talk was very 2023. Two years later, the inevitable collapse is well underway, and there’s not a blessed thing that can be done to reverse it without substantial change in the economic model of media and the displacement of the “broligarchy” that has poisoned it.

To review:

• Jeff Bezos decided he could, in fact, interfere in the editorial mission of the Washington Post if it was what he needed to do to deflect the ire of Donald Trump.
• Every major media organization sanitized Donald Trump and acted as a stenographer for him, his campaign and his White House, because they feared being kicked out of the WH Press Corps like the Associated Press. Spoiler: it didn’t matter.
• Social media companies X and Meta have quadrupled down on tolerance of disinformation and hate speech, algorithmically promoting it while limiting establishment media access to their platforms.
• Major news platforms have continued to move their opinion and editorial content toward the right with a “fine people on both sides” excuse of balance.
• Actual reporting on subjects of importance has been driven to the margins and now occurs mostly in publications and platforms that are outside of the traditional mainstream of mass media journalism.
• Media is dependent on Trump for its content, which focuses on the “wow that just happened” cycle of Trump’s stream-of-consciousness assault on governing and diplomatic norms, just as is intended. The more time they spend on catching up, the less time they have to analyze what’s actually going on and disseminate that information to the viewing/reading/listening public.
• Web platforms are gorging themselves on the clicks and ad views.

So, in short, media companies found it profitable for Trump to be around, if only for the rage watching/reading/clicking. But those returns are narrow and diminishing, because many people are just *not reading/watching/listening to the news anymore* to avoid being triggered by Orange Caligula.

This is also in line with Trump’s plan. It’s a weird corollary to the media strategy George W. Bush’s team devised : “If you tell a lie often enough it becomes accepted as the truth by media.” The Trump Corollary is “If you make people who don’t like you uncomforatable enough with your constant lies they get tired of trying to correct them and eventually they just stop listening so you can do whatever you want.”

I’ll be gathering data for an updated version of my talk, and will post the final version here. If you’ve got any media analysis data, sources or opinions you’d like to share for a shout-out in the talk, please leave comments here or email me at packetslost at falling-anvil dot com.

The TikTok ban (and the “deal” to restore it being proposed by the once and future President Trump) is, more than anything, protectionism veiled in national security language. It addressses a privacy concern by banning one service that is not a US-based concern, while not addressing the privacy and security issues that every other social platform has failed to address on their own adequately. And considering that China managed to hack law enforcement hooks into nearly every telecom service in the US, it’s a bit like closing the door to a barn that has already burned to the ground.

We are in a period of extended remix disinformation, unrestrained personal data harvesting, and algorithmic mass surveillance and manipulation that extends beyond social platforms into internet retail, education, search and as-a-service platforms. Every click, purchase, interaction, and view is being monetized in some way by default. Our ability as individuals to counter this is extremely limited; even when we opt out of data collection, we don’t really opt out of data collection-we just opt out of reaping its “benefits” within the platforms themselves.

Using Privacy Badger from Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is one way to at least staunch some of the privacy bleed. But as we’ve seen, Google, Meta and others keep finding ways to gather data to ‘monetize’ in some way through their browsers and apps.

That data can be used for ill by a variety of players—including cybercriminals who use targeted malicious advertising on websites and search engines to deliver malware. It has been used in the past to target disinformation campaigns and manipulate political discourse.

True free speech is speech without manipulation, and being able to choose which conversations you want to be part of. Shutting down TikTok because of its China ties—an act that the incoming administration will likely seek to reverse in exchange for favors—is not the answer. It’s not even addressing the right question.

We had roughly 5 inches of snow on January 6. I did my usual bird seed deployment that morning, along with an extra-generous toss of peanuts onto the porch roof outside my office. The result: a visit from some fine feathered friends, American Crows looking for an easy snack.

Steps advocates need to start taking now for the post-inaugural future.‬

So, Ken White (AKA Popehat) just posted something on how the frailties of a certain crack squad of sycophants might help prevent the total disaster commencing in January. Gotta say, probable but don’t count on it. Organizations & activists working with Trumpist-targeted groups need to plan otherwise.

Start teaching people how to use Signal. Have people with the right language skills help immigrant populations get access to technology that protects them from unwarranted surveillance and other algorithmic mining of their communications.

And when I say “use Signal,” that also means providing infrastructure within that environment for group chat, teaching people how to use disappearing messages, helping them with access to devices that can be used for Signal if they don’t have smartphones, providing opportunities for mutual identity verification and understanding how safety numbers and PINs work to keep them safe, and all of that.

These are things librarians, no matter how good they are at getting people in touch with technology these days, are not up to speed on. All organizations serving communities that are at risk should consider how they can best support people who will soon be targets to potential government sanctioned harassment, and potential deportation or other processes that will make their lives a lot more difficult.

Every-day people will need to do the same, because their lives are also going to be potentially more difficult. Chaos in government provides opportunity for criminal targeting of at risk communities. Keeping people informed of actual government activity and debunking disinformation is going to be super important in the coming months.

As a threat researcher, I am very attuned to the damage that can be done by exploiting fear, uncertainty and doubt for social engineering by all sorts of actors. I am readying myself for a target rich environment of threats to hunt and dissect.