#cyber fraud call

[rightnewshindi]

शातिरों ने 'कौन बनेगा करोड़पति' के नाम पर युवक से ठगे 11 लाख रुपए, फेसबुक लिंक से वारदात को दिया अंजाम

Hamirpur News: हिमाच��� प्रदेश के हमीरपुर (Hamirpur) में एक युवक के साथ बेहद शातिर अंदाज में ठगी कर ली गई. यह मामला ख्याह गांव का है. यहां युवक से ‘कौन बनेगा करोड़पति’ में साढ़े आठ लाख के कैश प्राइज के नाम पर 11 लाख की ठगी हो गई. इस मामले की शिकायत पीड़ित ने पुलिस से की. पुलिस ने केस दर्ज कर मामले की जांच शुरू कर दी है. जानकारी के अनुसार, पीड़ित युवक हमीरपुर के ख्याह गांव का रहने वाला है, जो…

[risingpakistan]

سائبر اور فون کال فراڈ؛ محتاط رہیے

پاکستان میں جہاں لوگ ڈکیتی کی وارداتوں سے پریشان ہیں، وہیں سائبر کرائمز میں بھی بہت تیزی سے اضافہ ہو رہا ہے۔ ان دنوں ایک نئے قسم کے فراڈ سے لٹیروں نے کئی لوگوں کو اپنی رقم سے محروم کر دیا۔ اس نئی طرز کے فراڈ میں ملوث افراد واردات کے لیے عام شہریوں کو کال کرتے ہیں۔ انتہائی تشویشناک بات یہ ہے کہ ان لوگوں کے پاس عوام کا ڈیٹا بھی موجود ہوتا ہے جس سے یہ بات ظاہر ہوتی ہے کہ ان کا ریکی کا نظام بہت منظم ہے یا پھر ان افراد کی موبائل ریکارڈز تک رسائی ہے۔ ٹیلی فونک فراڈ میں ملوث نوسرباز اکثر اپنے آپ کو پولیس افسر ظاہر کرتے ہیں۔ یہ کسی بھی شخص کو کال ملا کر اسے اس کے نام سے پکارتے ہیں اور بعد ازاں اسے یہ بتاتے ہیں کہ ’’آپ کے خاندان کا کوئی فرد ہمارے قبضے میں ہے، ہم تھانے سے ��ات کررہے ہیں‘‘۔ یہ گروہ اس قدر پلاننگ سے کام کرتا ہے کہ جس شخص کے متعلق یہ بتارہے ہوتے ہیں یہ افراد کال پر اس کی آواز بھی سناتے ہیں، جس میں وہ رو رو کر خود کو بچانے کی درخواست کر رہا ہوتا ہے۔ ایسی صورتحال میں جسے کال کی جاتی ہے اس کے اعصاب پر مکمل طور پر قابو پانے کے بعد اس سے پیسوں کو مطالبہ کیا جاتا ہے اور اسے یہ کہا جاتا ہے کہ اگر مقدمہ درج نہیں کرانا چاہتے تو پیسوں کا انتظام کرو ورنہ یا تو اسے مار دیا جائے گا یا اس کیس میں حوالات میں ڈال دیا جائے گا۔

اس فراڈ میں ملوث افراد شہریوں سے ان کی حیثیت کے مطابق لاکھوں روپے تک بٹورنے کی کوشش کرتے ہیں۔ کراچی جیسے بڑے شہر میں بھی کئی افراد اس فراڈ کا شکار ہو چکے ہیں۔ انجان کال کا یہ طریقہ واردات اس طرح سے ترتیب دیا گیا ہے کہ متاثرہ شخص کو سوچنے سمجھنے کا وقت ہی نہیں ملتا اور اس سے اچھی خاصی رقم بٹور لی جاتی ہے۔ بین الاقوامی ادارے کی تحقیق کے مطابق ایف آئی اے اہلکاروں کا کہنا ہے کہ اس نوعیت کے فراڈ میں ملوث اس گروہ میں سے اکثر افراد کا تعلق حافظ آباد، فیصل آباد، سرگودھا اور لاہور سے ہے۔ سرکاری ریکارڈ کے مطابق فون کالز سے کیے جانے فراڈ کے کیسوں کی تعداد اب ہزاروں میں پہنچ چکی ہے۔ واضح رہے کہ سائبر کرائم ونگ میں اب فائیننشل فراڈ کے کیسوں کی تعداد میں اضافہ ہو رہا ہے۔ ایسے کیس جعلی سم اور جعلی اکاؤنٹس کی وجہ سے بڑھ رہے ہیں، جن کی بدولت یہ گروہ شہریوں کا ریکارڈ باآسانی حاصل کر لیتے ہیں۔ سائبر کرائم نے ٹیلی کام کمپینوں کے عملے کے ایسے کئی افراد کو گرفتار بھی کیا ہے جو ڈیٹا فراہم کرنے میں ملوث ہیں۔

یہ فراڈیئے کال کرتے ہوئے وی پی این ایپلی کیشن سے اپنی کالر لوکیشن تبدیل کر لیتے ہیں جس کے باعث ان کے مقام کا معلوم کرنا کسی حد تک مشکل ہو جاتا ہے۔ ایسا بھی ہوتا ہے کہ یہ لوگ اسمارٹ فون کے بجائے سادہ فون کا استعمال کرتے ہیں اور واردات کے بعد اسے ضائع کر دیا جاتا ہے۔ یہ لوگ ایک ہی دن میں سیکڑوں نمبرز پر کال کرتے ہیں جبکہ ان کی کامیابی کی شرح 8 سے دس فیصد ہے۔ ٹیلی فون کال سے فراڈ کرنے والے کئی افراد جنھیں ایف آئی اے نے گرفتار بھی کیا اور انہیں سزائیں بھی ہوئی ہیں۔ صرف گزشتہ سال 500 سے زیادہ افراد کو گرفتار کیا گیا لیکن اس کے باوجود ان وارداتوں میں کمی نہیں آرہی۔ یقینی طور پر اس فراڈ میں ملوث افراد کا تعلق بھی آئی ٹی کے شعبوں سے ہو گا۔ ملک میں بے روزگاری کی وجہ سے جرائم کی شرح بڑھ رہی ہے۔ حکومتی سطح پر نوجوانوں کو تکنیکی تعلیم تو دی جارہی ہے لیکن ملازمت کے مواقعے موجود نہیں، جس کے نتائج اسی طرح نکلیں گے۔ جہاں حکومت اور ادارے ان افراد کو گرفتار کر کے کڑی سے کڑی سزا دیں، وہیں اس بات کی بھی کوشش کریں کہ آئی ٹی اور ہیکنگ کے ماہر نوجوانوں کو ملازمت کی فراہمی کو بھی یقینی بنایا جائے تاکہ وہ کسی منفی سرگرمی میں شامل نہ ہوں۔

یہاں یہ بات اہم ہے کہ عام شہری اس فراڈ سے کیسے بچیں؟ شہریوں کو اس طرح کے فراڈ سے بچنے کےلیے خود بھی محتاط رہنا ہو گا۔ شہریوں کو چاہیے کہ فون کال پر کسی بھی قسم کی ذاتی معلومات فراہم نہ کریں اور اگر کسی کے اغوا یا گرفتاری کے متعلق کوئی کال آئے تو سب سے پہلے اس شخص سے رابطہ کریں اور تصدیق کے بعد قانون نافذ کرنے والے اداروں سے رابطہ کریں۔ یہ افراد ایسے سافٹ ویئرز کا استعمال بھی کرتے ہیں جس سے نمبر بظاہر یو اے این لگتا ہے۔ اس حوالے سے بینک انتظامیہ کئی بار ہدایات جاری کر چکی ہیں کہ بینک کسی قسم کی ذاتی معلومات ٹیلی فون پر نہیں لیتا۔ شہریوں کو اس بات کو ذہن نشین کرنا ہو گا۔ آج کے اس جدید دور میں بھی معصوم لوگ ٹی وی چینلز کے گیم شو کے نام پر لٹ رہے ہیں، عوام کو اب احتیاط سے کام لینا ہو گا ورنہ مشکل حالات میں مزید پریشانی کا سامنا کرنا پڑسکتا ہے۔

شہریار شوکت

بشکریہ ایکسپریس نیوز

[mostlysignssomeportents]

How I got scammed

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/05/cyber-dunning-kruger/#swiss-cheese-security

I wuz robbed.

More specifically, I was tricked by a phone-phisher pretending to be from my bank, and he convinced me to hand over my credit-card number, then did $8,000+ worth of fraud with it before I figured out what happened. And then he tried to do it again, a week later!

Here's what happened. Over the Christmas holiday, I traveled to New Orleans. The day we landed, I hit a Chase ATM in the French Quarter for some cash, but the machine declined the transaction. Later in the day, we passed a little credit-union's ATM and I used that one instead (I bank with a one-branch credit union and generally there's no fee to use another CU's ATM).

A couple days later, I got a call from my credit union. It was a weekend, during the holiday, and the guy who called was obviously working for my little CU's after-hours fraud contractor. I'd dealt with these folks before – they service a ton of little credit unions, and generally the call quality isn't great and the staff will often make mistakes like mispronouncing my credit union's name.

That's what happened here – the guy was on a terrible VOIP line and I had to ask him to readjust his mic before I could even understand him. He mispronounced my bank's name and then asked if I'd attempted to spend $1,000 at an Apple Store in NYC that day. No, I said, and groaned inwardly. What a pain in the ass. Obviously, I'd had my ATM card skimmed – either at the Chase ATM (maybe that was why the transaction failed), or at the other credit union's ATM (it had been a very cheap looking system).

I told the guy to block my card and we started going through the tedious business of running through recent transactions, verifying my identity, and so on. It dragged on and on. These were my last hours in New Orleans, and I'd left my family at home and gone out to see some of the pre-Mardi Gras krewe celebrations and get a muffalata, and I could tell that I was going to run out of time before I finished talking to this guy.

"Look," I said, "you've got all my details, you've frozen the card. I gotta go home and meet my family and head to the airport. I'll call you back on the after-hours number once I'm through security, all right?"

He was frustrated, but that was his problem. I hung up, got my sandwich, went to the airport, and we checked in. It was total chaos: an Alaska Air 737 Max had just lost its door-plug in mid-air and every Max in every airline's fleet had been grounded, so the check in was crammed with people trying to rebook. We got through to the gate and I sat down to call the CU's after-hours line. The person on the other end told me that she could only handle lost and stolen cards, not fraud, and given that I'd already frozen the card, I should just drop by the branch on Monday to get a new card.

We flew home, and later the next day, I logged into my account and made a list of all the fraudulent transactions and printed them out, and on Monday morning, I drove to the bank to deal with all the paperwork. The folks at the CU were even more pissed than I was. The fraud that run up to more than $8,000, and if Visa refused to take it out of the merchants where the card had been used, my little credit union would have to eat the loss.

I agreed and commiserated. I also pointed out that their outsource, after-hours fraud center bore some blame here: I'd canceled the card on Saturday but most of the fraud had taken place on Sunday. Something had gone wrong.

One cool thing about banking at a tiny credit-union is that you end up talking to people who have actual authority, responsibility and agency. It turned out the the woman who was processing my fraud paperwork was a VP, and she decided to look into it. A few minutes later she came back and told me that the fraud center had no record of having called me on Saturday.

"That was the fraudster," she said.

Oh, shit. I frantically rewound my conversation, trying to figure out if this could possibly be true. I hadn't given him anything apart from some very anodyne info, like what city I live in (which is in my Wikipedia entry), my date of birth (ditto), and the last four digits of my card.

Wait a sec.

He hadn't asked for the last four digits. He'd asked for the last seven digits. At the time, I'd found that very frustrating, but now – "The first nine digits are the same for every card you issue, right?" I asked the VP.

I'd given him my entire card number.

Goddammit.

The thing is, I know a lot about fraud. I'm writing an entire series of novels about this kind of scam:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865878/thebezzle

And most summers, I go to Defcon, and I always go to the "social engineering" competitions where an audience listens as a hacker in a soundproof booth cold-calls merchants (with the owner's permission) and tries to con whoever answers the phone into giving up important information.

But I'd been conned.

Now look, I knew I could be conned. I'd been conned before, 13 years ago, by a Twitter worm that successfully phished out of my password via DM:

https://locusmag.com/2010/05/cory-doctorow-persistence-pays-parasites/

That scam had required a miracle of timing. It started the day before, when I'd reset my phone to factory defaults and reinstalled all my apps. That same day, I'd published two big online features that a lot of people were talking about. The next morning, we were late getting out of the house, so by the time my wife and I dropped the kid at daycare and went to the coffee shop, it had a long line. Rather than wait in line with me, my wife sat down to read a newspaper, and so I pulled out my phone and found a Twitter DM from a friend asking "is this you?" with a URL.

Assuming this was something to do with those articles I'd published the day before, I clicked the link and got prompted for my Twitter login again. This had been happening all day because I'd done that mobile reinstall the day before and all my stored passwords had been wiped. I entered it but the page timed out. By that time, the coffees were ready. We sat and chatted for a bit, then went our own ways.

I was on my way to the office when I checked my phone again. I had a whole string of DMs from other friends. Each one read "is this you?" and had a URL.

Oh, shit, I'd been phished.

If I hadn't reinstalled my mobile OS the day before. If I hadn't published a pair of big articles the day before. If we hadn't been late getting out the door. If we had been a little more late getting out the door (so that I'd have seen the multiple DMs, which would have tipped me off).

There's a name for this in security circles: "Swiss-cheese security." Imagine multiple slices of Swiss cheese all stacked up, the holes in one slice blocked by the slice below it. All the slices move around and every now and again, a hole opens up that goes all the way through the stack. Zap!

The fraudster who tricked me out of my credit card number had Swiss cheese security on his side. Yes, he spoofed my bank's caller ID, but that wouldn't have been enough to fool me if I hadn't been on vacation, having just used a pair of dodgy ATMs, in a hurry and distracted. If the 737 Max disaster hadn't happened that day and I'd had more time at the gate, I'd have called my bank back. If my bank didn't use a slightly crappy outsource/out-of-hours fraud center that I'd already had sub-par experiences with. If, if, if.

The next Friday night, at 5:30PM, the fraudster called me back, pretending to be the bank's after-hours center. He told me my card had been compromised again. But: I hadn't removed my card from my wallet since I'd had it replaced. Also, it was half an hour after the bank closed for the long weekend, a very fraud-friendly time. And when I told him I'd call him back and asked for the after-hours fraud number, he got very threatening and warned me that because I'd now been notified about the fraud that any losses the bank suffered after I hung up the phone without completing the fraud protocol would be billed to me. I hung up on him. He called me back immediately. I hung up on him again and put my phone into do-not-disturb.

The following Tuesday, I called my bank and spoke to their head of risk-management. I went through everything I'd figured out about the fraudsters, and she told me that credit unions across America were being hit by this scam, by fraudsters who somehow knew CU customers' phone numbers and names, and which CU they banked at. This was key: my phone number is a reasonably well-kept secret. You can get it by spending money with Equifax or another nonconsensual doxing giant, but you can't just google it or get it at any of the free services. The fact that the fraudsters knew where I banked, knew my name, and had my phone number had really caused me to let down my guard.

The risk management person and I talked about how the credit union could mitigate this attack: for example, by better-training the after-hours card-loss staff to be on the alert for calls from people who had been contacted about supposed card fraud. We also went through the confusing phone-menu that had funneled me to the wrong department when I called in, and worked through alternate wording for the menu system that would be clearer (this is the best part about banking with a small CU – you can talk directly to the responsible person and have a productive discussion!). I even convinced her to buy a ticket to next summer's Defcon to attend the social engineering competitions.

There's a leak somewhere in the CU systems' supply chain. Maybe it's Zelle, or the small number of corresponding banks that CUs rely on for SWIFT transaction forwarding. Maybe it's even those after-hours fraud/card-loss centers. But all across the USA, CU customers are getting calls with spoofed caller IDs from fraudsters who know their registered phone numbers and where they bank.

I've been mulling this over for most of a month now, and one thing has really been eating at me: the way that AI is going to make this kind of problem much worse.

Not because AI is going to commit fraud, though.

One of the truest things I know about AI is: "we're nowhere near a place where bots can steal your job, we're certainly at the point where your boss can be suckered into firing you and replacing you with a bot that fails at doing your job":

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/15/passive-income-brainworms/#four-hour-work-week

I trusted this fraudster specifically because I knew that the outsource, out-of-hours contractors my bank uses have crummy headsets, don't know how to pronounce my bank's name, and have long-ass, tedious, and pointless standardized questionnaires they run through when taking fraud reports. All of this created cover for the fraudster, whose plausibility was enhanced by the rough edges in his pitch - they didn't raise red flags.

As this kind of fraud reporting and fraud contacting is increasingly outsourced to AI, bank customers will be conditioned to dealing with semi-automated systems that make stupid mistakes, force you to repeat yourself, ask you questions they should already know the answers to, and so on. In other words, AI will groom bank customers to be phishing victims.

This is a mistake the finance sector keeps making. 15 years ago, Ben Laurie excoriated the UK banks for their "Verified By Visa" system, which validated credit card transactions by taking users to a third party site and requiring them to re-enter parts of their password there:

https://web.archive.org/web/20090331094020/http://www.links.org/?p=591

This is exactly how a phishing attack works. As Laurie pointed out, this was the banks training their customers to be phished.

I came close to getting phished again today, as it happens. I got back from Berlin on Friday and my suitcase was damaged in transit. I've been dealing with the airline, which means I've really been dealing with their third-party, outsource luggage-damage service. They have a terrible website, their emails are incoherent, and they officiously demand the same information over and over again.

This morning, I got a scam email asking me for more information to complete my damaged luggage claim. It was a terrible email, from a noreply@ email address, and it was vague, officious, and dishearteningly bureaucratic. For just a moment, my finger hovered over the phishing link, and then I looked a little closer.

On any other day, it wouldn't have had a chance. Today – right after I had my luggage wrecked, while I'm still jetlagged, and after days of dealing with my airline's terrible outsource partner – it almost worked.

So much fraud is a Swiss-cheese attack, and while companies can't close all the holes, they can stop creating new ones.

Meanwhile, I'll continue to post about it whenever I get scammed. I find the inner workings of scams to be fascinating, and it's also important to remind people that everyone is vulnerable sometimes, and scammers are willing to try endless variations until an attack lands at just the right place, at just the right time, in just the right way. If you think you can't get scammed, that makes you especially vulnerable:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/24/passive-income/#swiss-cheese-security

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[infocoverage]

5 Safety Tips to Prevent Online Banking Fraud

5 Safety Tips to Prevent Online Banking Fraud

5 Safety Tips to Prevent Online Banking Fraud: Financial transactions through online net banking or mobile banking are now available at your fingertips, but they come with significant risks as well. It could be challenging to differentiate between a real website and a phoney one because many fraudsters create pages or websites that seem remarkably similar to the bank’s official website. Every…

[celticcrossanon]

Hello Celta, Long time no see. I hope all is well.

I’m writing to bring you some juicy gossip from 1. Bookworm2 on YouTube, 2. a jailing of a sugar, and 3. lady C will be unmasking ugly after all and 4. Meghan regrets telling kids she’s the most bullied.

Bookworm does have some far reaching long term contacts at the palace and elsewhere in the US., truly people in the know. When you publish my ask I will attach her latest video. Allegedly Archwell, is rumoured to be under investigation by the Feds and IRS. There’s the matter of the missing millions from Archwell, and failure to declare it. BUT BUT BUT there’s also the matter of the Harkles, Meghan in particular uttering death threats across state lines, as part of an FBI cyber bullying investigation. This latter charge relates to the extreme bullying and harassment Catherine underwent during her cancer diagnosis and treatment. Catherine allegedly received some really nasty death threats while she was secluded from the public, at the height of the ‘Wheres Kate’ psychodrama online. Remember William went to visit M15 and it was publicized everywhere?? Two card readers, Mad World Tarot included, did a reading that showed the 3 of pentacles card, involvement through a third party. I wonder if they were able to trace the financial angle ie payment from Archwell. Or one of the third party, ie the death threat poster, probably squealed about his motivation and bosses. MWT saw William’s energy behind this. They truly thought online threats were untraceable. Consequences people consequences.

Avid Gardener and Trevor Coult on YouTube has the woman accused of trying to bomb Buckingham Palace brought up on charges against them. She made the threat on Twitter brazenly and openly. She’s also issued death threats to Avid and her husband and had bullied Trevor out of his charity job and home. She’s been named in the press as Diane Durham, 62, and she’s an immense sugar. Stupid woman pleaded not guilty after first admitting everything. It moves on to the high court for sentencing. I think the police are concurrently investigating the YouTube harassment claims. She stands to lose her house to Trevor in damages. I have no sympathy. Consequences people consequences.

On a related topic Lady C will most likely take go fund me to court because of the illegal reopening of her money raising drive for Mr thomas Markle Snr. She alleges that someone with connections had go fund me reopen the fundraiser after it was closed as per her contract with them, and called the newspaper to accuse her of fraud, all within the space of a few days. First she threatened the newspaper with a lawsuit if they ran the story, and then she threatened go fund me after they tried to brush her off, by telling her they couldn’t identify the member of staff of go fund me due to privacy reasons. She’s not having it AT ALL. And will see them in court. She strongly hints that she suspects Meghan and Harry are behind it, again through third parties. They want to damage her reputation and get her off YouTube. I think they mistakenly identified Lady C as a pushover. Don’t they anything about her life? lol. Consequences people consequences.

There’s also a threat by the UK bullied staff to be released from their NDAs to speak on camera about Meghan’s Bullying Report buried by the Queen. This, after she went to some girls charity last week. and claimed to be the most bullied person in the world. I bet she’s regretting that now. Consequences people consequences.

They both must be sweating bullets. No wonder Harry is nowhere to be seen. I hear a rumour he’s either in Australia to harass his father, or he’s in the UK hoping to be named counsellor of State while dear old pop is away. Harry is so dumb, all he cares about are the perks of the BRF and never about the consequences of his actions. He’s thicker than a brick.

There you go. It’s quite a lot, and I hope sooner rather than later they face justice in some form or another.

Hi AnonymousRetired,

All is very well with me, thank you for asking.

Thank you as well for sending in such a lot of lovely gossip. It looks like things are starting to move against the Harkles. Like you, I hope that all the perpetrators face justice, and sooner rather than later.

Videos referred to in the gossip (I hope these are the right ones): Note: I still need the ones from Lady C

Bookworm 2

Avid Gardener

Trevor Coult MC

Mad World Tarot

[mariacallous]

Joint ODNI, FBI, and CISA Statement

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ODNI News Release No. 29-24 November 4, 2024

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released the following statement:

“Since our statement on Friday, the IC has been observing foreign adversaries, particularly Russia, conducting additional influence operations intended to undermine public confidence in the integrity of U.S. elections and stoke divisions among Americans. The IC expects these activities will intensify through election day and in the coming weeks, and that foreign influence narratives will focus on swing states.

Russia is the most active threat. Influence actors linked to Russia in particular are manufacturing videos and creating fake articles to undermine the legitimacy of the election, instill fear in voters regarding the election process, and suggest Americans are using violence against each other due to political preferences, judging from information available to the IC. These efforts risk inciting violence, including against election officials. We anticipate Russian actors will release additional manufactured content with these themes through election day and in the days and weeks after polls close.

The IC assesses that Russian influence actors recently posted and amplified an article falsely claiming that U.S. officials across swing states plan to orchestrate election fraud using a range of tactics, such as ballot stuffing and cyber attacks.

Russian influence actors also manufactured and amplified a recent video that falsely depicted an interview with an individual claiming election fraud in Arizona, which involved creating fake overseas ballots and changing voter rolls to favor Vice President Kamala Harris. The Arizona Secretary of State has already refuted the video’s claim as false.

Iran also remains a significant foreign influence threat to U.S. elections. As noted in a prior update, we have assessed that Iran has conducted malicious cyber activities to compromise former President Trump’s campaign. Iranian influence actors may also seek to create fake media content intended to suppress voting or stoke violence, as they have done in past election cycles. We previously reported that Iran also remains determined to seek revenge against select former US officials whom it views as culpable for the death of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) Commander Soleimani in January 2020. It has repeatedly highlighted former President Donald Trump among its priority targets for retribution.

In light of continued influence efforts by foreign adversaries and the increasing volume of inauthentic content online, CISA recommends voters seek out information from trusted, official sources, in particular, state and local election officials.

The FBI and CISA encourage campaigns and election infrastructure stakeholders to report information concerning suspicious or criminal activity to their local Election Crime Coordinators via FBI field office (www.fbi.gov/fieldoffices), by calling 1-800-CALL-FBI (1-800-225-5324), or online at ic3.gov. Cyber incidents impacting election infrastructure can also be reported to CISA by calling 1-844-Say-CISA (1-844-729-2472), emailing report@cisa.dhs.gov, or reporting online at cisa.gov/report. Election infrastructure stakeholders and the public can find additional resources about how to protect against cyber and physical threats at CISA’s #PROTECT2024 (https://www.cisa.gov/protect2024).”

[mars101]

Haunted To Meet You

☆ PAIRING/S = burglar!hyunjae x spirit!reader

☆ GENRE = angst, absolutely ZERO romance, uhm spooky (not but the setting is ig)

☆ WARNINGS = hyunjae breaks into a manor, and steals, and doesn't get caught. you're already dead, uhm reader gets played kinda?? (sorry..)

☆ WORD COUNT = 1.6k

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★ SYNOPSIS = after a successful break in at the empty manor in the forest, hyunjae not only steals precious valuables but also the heart of a lost spirit

★ RELEASE DATE = 11.01.24 (idc if its a day late from halloween.)

★ AUTHOR’S WELCOME = happy halloween season ! (NOT) who's ready to watch mars disappear for months again??? ok have fun i love yall

╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴╴>

Hyunjae was rich. Not in the conventional way, though, as he robbed people. Rich or poor, it didn't matter to him as long as he could make a profit. And he wasn't the only one in his friend group to hurt innocent people, too. Crypto scams, conning, fraud, cyber crimes, and even flat-out identity theft were an easy way for the friends to live the life they always wanted.

But even if you're in a group of intelligent people, you're still with a group of men. Which is why Hyunjae found himself at the abandoned manor in the woods during late October. A bet caused Hyunjae and Eric to compete on who can bring the most valuable objects out without getting spooked.

“Get ready to watch the footage of you losing later, Hyunjae~” Eric says, pointing a finger in front of the other male’s face as his other hand connects his stolen Meta Ray-Ban glasses to his phone. “Alright boys, you’re watching the winners' pov right now, it’s me, Eric! Ready to—”

“We can all hear you Eric…” A voice comes through an earpiece the two have in to hear the others and the rules for the bet. “Anyways.. you’ve got an hour and a half. No running off, no stealing what the other had already claimed, and yeah. 1,2,3 go-” At the sudden countdown, the two men quickly bolted to the manor’s entrance. Hyunjae deciding to open the front doors by giving it a few hard kicks while Eric uses a random rock to break the fragile windows.

When the door was forced open, it was like a cool gust of air engulfed Hyunjae's body as he took in the sight of the dark and grand interior. “You have a flashlight, right?” Hyunjae asks the man jumping through the window before taking out his own flashlight. Eric doesn’t reply, but instead, he pulls out a flashlight and quickly flashes the bright light in Hyunjae’s eyes. “See you around.. or not!” he grins before running off to a random corridor.

Opposite to Eric’s instincts to explore everything, Hyunjae takes his time to look around the entrance, taking notice of the many paintings that lead to the staircase in the middle of the place. But a few old paintings wasn’t going to satisfy his need to find a more valuable object. This is why he found himself following the wind blowing through the front door (and Eric’s window) heading up the grand staircase.

A creak on each step made Hyunjae more aware of his surroundings, the flashlight in his hands now being moved from side to side quickly than before. The closer he got to the second floor, the more uneased he felt. There was a chill running through his back, the hair on his arms were starting to stick up, and a faint whisper was heard in his ear. Usual factors when walking through an abandoned building but it’s different as Hyunjae has never experienced this, but also, there’s a visible silhouette among the shadows beckoning him down the never-ending hallway.

“Holy shit- Hello??” Hyunjae calls out to the figure as he blinks his eyes open and close again and again, hoping that it's just a figure of his imagination. In response to his hello, Hyunjae watches as the figure walks towards a room in the empty hall. The slightly ajar door starts to slowly creak open as the figure floats past it. “Oh my god, are you kidding me? Why does it have to be me?” he mumbles as the voices in his ear (the guys) get louder.

‘follow it!’

‘say hi’

‘this guy thinks he's the main character.. ’

The buzzing of the constant voices coming through makes Hyunjae irritated. To the point where he pulls out the earpiece in frustration and shoves the tiny electronic in his pocket. Grumbles of mumbles leave his mouth as he walks down the hallway. His eyes try not to look into the room the figure went into, but when he walks by the door opens wider, as if it's welcoming him in.

With the sight of the dark curtains draped over the grand windows and numerous white cloths covering furniture, his head is saying not to go in. But his heart is pounding against his chest at the idea of what he’ll find. Hyunjae steps closer to the doorway, his feet having a mind of their own as they lead him into the room.

Once both of his feet are planted inside of the room, he freezes. Instantly, he feels the chill run down his back again. As if a hand was trailing down his spine. His eyes dart around the room, he's too anxious to look behind him so he tries to find comfort in what's in front of him, and he does.

All of the nerves on his body leave him as soon as he takes sight of the pendants and jewels by the window. His shoulders that felt like they had the weight of a hundred men are now as light as a feather as he ignores everything else around him and makes his way torwards the windowsill.

A breathy ‘holy shit’ leaves his mouth as Hyunjae's eyes look over the gems. Some pieces are broken off from each other or cracked. But the value of them are still there. Out of all the pieces, one pendant stands out from the rest. A red oval-cut ruby that shines with the moonlight seeping through the window's curtains.

“Beautiful, isn't it?”

Hyunjae looks beside him and jumps as the ghastly figure takes form beside him. The slightly misty air slowly conjures itself into the shape of a person. The figure takes no mind to Hyunjae's reaction as their fingers ghost over the pendant's gem.

“When I was alive, it was a gift from my father.. He said it's as beautiful as the heart inside of me.” The figure whispers out into the atmosphere. With the sign of no malicious intent from the ghost, Hyunjae comes closer to the windowsill, his hands hovering over the many jewels and stopping above the ghost's ‘heart’.

“So you're dead.? Why are you still here? In this.. dark and scary manor..” Hyunjae asks, his eyes never leaving the ‘heart’.

“I'm trapped.”

“Trapped?”

Hyunjae finally takes one look at the ghost and notices the sad look that fills the apparition's eyes. “Trapped in the manor?”

“Not only that.. But my soul's in there.” The ghost softly points a finger to the pendant. Hyunjae's finger gets cold as the spirit's own finger gets closer. “All of the other pendants are broken because everyone else was able to escape. I'm the only one left..”

“Ohh..” His hands pick up the pendant, playing with it in his hand. “So, how would you be able to escape?”

“The other's dissappeared when their pendant was either cracked or broken. So maybe if!-”

“I would have to break this?” The spirit nods at Hyunjae's words. “Me? Break this beautiful, expensive jewel..?” His hand pockets the pendant before moving to grab all of the other broken gems on the windowsill.

“If I break it the full value would be lost, wouldn't it? I'd definitely win a million with a Jewel like this.”

“What?!-”

“Hyunjae!! Put the ear piece on!! Times up-” Eric yells out from the bottom floor, interrupting the ghost.

The male taps a finger on his ear to tease the ghost, “Sounds like I've got to go. Maybe next time.” All fear that Hyunjae felt when he stepped in was lost as he realized how harmless the manor’s spirit was. The usual confidence that he has fills the man's body as he walks out the room backwards, winking at the spirit fading away in anger.

As he walks back down the stairs, hands grab and pull at the bag on his arm but he doesn't care. “Eric!” Hyunjae hops off the last two steps, he quickly reaches the younger male who's holding three of the big paintings.

Eric does a little spin with the paintings on him, “Like my finds? You look like you're missing a few things”

Hyunjae taps on his bag, the movement of the jewels making a rattling sound, before his hands start to ruffle Eric’s hair, “All in this bag, let's go and see what the guys think.” He leads the way out of the manor, despite the october weather the outside is warm compared to the building.

“Dude- I'm so disappointed.. I didn't see any spirits at all.”

“I did. It was very, disappointing though..”

☆★☆ AUTHOR’S GOODBYE = IDC IF IT SUCKS I HAVE NO YIME NO FREE TIME I HAVE TOO MUCH AP LITERATURE WORK TOO MUCH HTML WORK TOO MUCH STATS WORK TOO MUCH STUFF TO DO AHHHHHHHHHH I HATE IT I HATE IT I HATE IT I HAVE NO TIME AND I TOLD SOMEONE I THINK THEYRE ATTRACTIVE YESTERDAY AND IM STILL LEFT WITH NO ANSWER WTFFFFFFFFFFFFD AHHHHHHHHHQHSHJAJAJABDHAJAHA GET OUT GET OUT GET OUTTTTTTT

☆★☆ TAGLIST = @sanasour, @boomhoon, @loonaluvz, @deoboyznet

[brf-rumortrackinganon]

Why doesn’t Meghan ever get called out on being such a massive, massive FRAUD? Or her extremely dodgy (at best 🙄) activities disguised as ‘work’ or ‘philanthropy’… it annoys me immensely. I have never seen a con artist and grifter of this level, who isn’t even that intelligent or sly, I might add, that gets away with all of her intentional wrongdoings. It’s beyond vile that somebody so grossly undeserving of what she has cheated her way into just keeps getting to go on unscathed like nothing ever happened. She’s blatantly ripping off Martha Stewart, Goop/ Gwyneth and flamingo estate - and probably many other smaller influencers or companies and trying to make a profit. It just absolutely speaks to her disgusting, never ending black hole of greed that consumes her. It seems like she is beyond desperate to become mega wealthy and has tunnel vision no matter how delusional and futile it is. ARO will fail like it deserves to, but she will never take the hint 🙄

Why Meghan hasn't met her maker yet:

She's protected by a hugely toxic fanbase that is known to dox, cyber-bully, and cyber-stalk accounts/people that speak out against her.

Her race card is still packs a punch. (It might be a weak punch, but it's still a punch nonetheless.)

The BRF's continued protection of Harry also covers Meghan.

[codenamed-queenie]

Barbara: All these women out here saying they want equal pay, equal rights, equal opportunities, blah, blah, blah--

Barbara: And yet none of them are stepping up to commit 50% of phishing scams.

Barbara: None of them are stepping up to commit 50% of the cyber attacks against the Russian government.

Barbara: None of them are stepping up to commit 50% of Twitter account fraud, calling big corporations out on their greedy bullshit economics.

Barbara: It's literally just. Me.

Dick: *Just trying to enjoy his evening coffee in peace*

[collapsedsquid]

A week of fighting between armed groups and Myanmar’s military on the northern border with China has left dozens dead, displaced thousands and prompted surviving cyber scam centres to shift operations further along a dangerous frontier controlled by crime gangs and warlords. A trio of armed ethnic groups under the banner of the “Three Brotherhood Alliance” launched artillery strikes and ground offensives on October 27, taking strategic border towns and hitting Myanmar junta posts across a large swathe of Shan State. Videos of hundreds of RPGs, rifles and motors apparently seized from junta forces in the so-called Operation 1027, have been shared across their Facebook page The Kokang, in operations which they say aim to stop “the Burmese military’s non-stop airstrikes” and “eradicate the internet fraud rings and their protective networks”.

Demand that the US step up support for the rebels fighting the Tatmadaw so I can stop receiving the endless text messages about packages that USPS has for me

[iimtcollege]

Uttar Pradesh's Transport Minister, Daya Shankar Singh, praised IIMT College for promoting cyber safety. Online fraud is a common issue, and COE-DFIR, a collaboration between IIMT College and Future Crime Research Foundation, aims to train future cyber defenders.

.

Call Us: 9520886860

.

#IIMTIndia #IIMTian #IIMTNoida #IIMTGreaterNoida #IIMTDelhiNCR

#CyberSafety #IIMTCollege #COEDFIR #CyberDefense #DigitalSecurity #OnlineFraudPrevention #FutureCyberDefenders #UPTransportMinister #TechEducation #SafeOnline #CyberAwareness

[australianwomensnews]

When it comes to Australia’s national regulators, women rule.

Women now dominate the leadership of federal regulatory and oversight agencies that enforce rules for business and the economy, with 33 women holding chief executive or chair roles. This signals a profound shift for the nation’s top watchdogs, once almost solely the domain of male enforcers.

Rapid digitisation and rising globalisation are making traditional black letter enforcement approaches less effective, leading to women with so-called solid soft skills, such as influence, collaboration and communication, winning top-tier regulatory roles.

Women are now at the front line of the battles against scams, identity and data theft, cyber ransomware attacks, electronic espionage, digital surveillance, misinformation, social media abuse and dark web criminality.

“It’s very different to the skills base you needed a decade or two ago where it was just about telling people what to do, and they would toe the line,” says Ann Sherry, a former head of the Office of Status of Women in the Hawke and Keating governments.

“Those jobs were filled by a particular sort of person cast as a regulator. So, in a way, it was almost an enforcement role, whereas the jobs have changed.”

The leadership of the federal public service reached gender equilibrium last year.

Sherry, who is now QUT chancellor and chairs Queensland Airports, digital marketing firm Enero and UNICEF Australia, says that the public sector has been better at promoting women through the ranks but that many women have also built relevant skills in the private sector.

“Many women have had to broaden their careers and build a broad set of skills to be successful. There is now a body of capability to draw up. The talent pool has changed, and the jobs require broader skills. It is a confluence of events,” she says.

The surge in women leading federal regulators compares with 19 women (10 per cent) chairing ASX200 companies and 26 women (9 per cent) who are CEOs across the ASX300, as at the end of 2023.

Competition chief Gina Cass-Gottlieb and Reserve Bank of Australia governor Michele Bullock (who also chairs the Payments System Board) are the first women to lead their institutions. Others, such as media watchdog Nerida O’Loughlin and energy regulator Clare Savage, have won second appointments.

A push to bring in new blood from outside the Australian public service helped veteran NSW regulator Elizabeth Tydd win an appointment as head of the Australian Information Commission. Carly Kind was tapped from a London think tank to be the new privacy commissioner.

They join a swag of women now overseeing vast swaths of the economy, including infrastructure (Gabrielle Trainor), aviation (Pip Spence), food (Sandra Cuthbert), petroleum (Sue McCarrey) and fisheries (Helen Kroger).

Others such as Rachel Noble (espionage), Julie Inman Grant (e-safety), Jayde Richmond (anti-scams centre) and Michelle McGuinness (cyber co-ordinator) are focused on rapidly emerging harms, including national security threats, identity and data theft, consumer abuse, online scams and fraud.

Workplace and safety regulators are now dominated by women too, including Anna Booth (Fair Work Ombudsman), Joanne Farrell (Safe Work Australia), Jeanine Drummond (maritime safety), Natalie Pelham (rail safety) and Janet Anderson (aged care).

The dominant role female regulators play has been part of a profound shift in the number of women in leadership roles in the Australian government. This has risen from a quarter of executive roles being held by women 20 years ago to over 50 per cent last year.

Battle ready

Australian Competition and Consumer Commission chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb, who rose through the ranks as a competition lawyer at law firm Gilbert and Tobin, says her generation of leaders had battled their way through male-dominated workplaces.

“In those workplaces, to get ahead, we needed to target the areas we thought were most important to make an intervention and where we could most effectively make an impact.

“We actually had to build skills to succeed, which are beneficial skills in these roles.”

Ms Cass-Gottlieb says women have also had to differentiate themselves. “You needed to point to other ways of working, including creative and different solutions that drew from experience in various areas rather than a pure step-by-step standard career path.”

Australian Information Commissioner Tydd points to Columbia University research that measured creativity by analysing songs, finding that women created more songs than men.

“Digital government requires a creative use of proactive tools to identify and mitigate future harm. It’s the unforeseen or latent harms that are the most refractory and so we’ve got to look at diagnosis and predictive tools, and that’s where you start to get a bit creative.”

Tydd says she was attracted to regulatory work because of the value of promoting open government, transparency and accountability.

“I think that seeking service and purpose orientation are factors that drive people into this work and I do think seeking service is a very comfortable and well-established motivation within women.”

Demand for new approaches

According to ANU Crawford School of Public Policy director Professor Janine O’Flynn, the data on the importance of public motivation for women is mixed. However, she suggests that women’s more attuned risk and relationship skills help them to be more effective regulators.

“We certainly know that the most effective models of regulation are around how you can think about risk and how you build relationships with the parties that have been regulated.

“I don’t mean that in a sort of dodgy way. The higher the trust relationships you can get between regulators and those who are regulated, the more likely you are to get the outcomes that you’re looking for.”

Read the full article in the link above!

[mostlysignssomeportents]

This day in history

I'm coming to DEFCON! TOMORROW (Aug 9), I'm emceeing the EFF POKER TOURNAMENT (noon at the Horseshoe Poker Room), and appearing on the BRICKED AND ABANDONED panel (5PM, LVCC - L1 - HW1–11–01). On SATURDAY (Aug 10), I'm giving a keynote called "DISENSHITTIFY OR DIE! How hackers can seize the means of computation and build a new, good internet that is hardened against our asshole bosses' insatiable horniness for enshittification" (noon, LVCC - L1 - HW1–11–01).

#15yrsago Exhaustive index of fearmongering Daily Mail stories about cancer and its causes https://web.archive.org/web/20090815070522/http://kill-or-cure.heroku.com/

#5yrsago Hospital checklists work really well — except when they’re not used https://www.nature.com/articles/523516a

#5yrsago Science fiction and the law: beyond mere courtroom drama https://reactormag.com/will-there-be-justice-science-fiction-and-the-law/

#5yrsago Grifty “Students For Trump” founder pleads guilty to wire fraud for pretending to be a lawyer https://www.nydailynews.com/2019/08/06/students-for-trump-founder-pleads-guilty-to-posing-as-lawyer-in-46k-scam/

#5yrsago Security researcher cracks high-security lock used for ATMs, Air Force One, military bases https://www.reuters.com/article/us-locks-cyber-exclusive/exclusive-high-security-locks-for-government-and-banks-hacked-by-researcher-idUSKCN1UW26Z/

#5yrsago Taiwanese sympathizers are shipping helmets and gas-masks to Hong Kong https://asiatimes.com/2019/08/helmets-goggles-sent-from-taiwan-to-hk-protesters/

#5yrsago Tiktok is valued at $75b, is spending $3m/day on US advertising, and in China, it has been turned into a state propaganda vehicle https://www.theverge.com/interface/2019/8/7/20757855/tiktok-growth-monetization-influencers-regulation

#5yrsago Medical examiner quits after declaring that bloody, stabbed corpse had died of “natural causes” https://www.fox5atlanta.com/news/gwinnett-county-me-investigator-resigns-after-misinterpreted-autopsy

#5yrsago CHESSES: chess variants for nonexperts, nonplayers, and the very playful https://pippinbarr.com/chesses/

[reportscammers]

Hi peirogi how are you?! Saw your last tube videos they where fantastic my friend just like you but I am very sad that you aren't covering Kolkata based scammers and fake fraud call centres from some time I sent you several message some to which you replied in common but I have found some valuable information about Chinese fraudsters who are now conducting fraud to American and Indian innocent peoples too I have some videos phone numbers even pictures and I can provide informations about lots of scammers who are ruthless people and have no humanity left in them i too unknowingly them worked for about a week but then I felt something is not right and my inner instinct stopped me from continuing so I quit it for ever now I want to join your team back and work against this cyber criminals and I also have a request on behalf of a lady from new jersey who told she has been scammed with some money by some Indian and Chinese scammers which I can find as they are from Kolkata India but for that I need your support and assurance of my safety as they all are very dangerous peoples.

Please do contact me back asap I'll wait for your response keep up your good work bro you are my inspiration my legend love you man 👍

Regards

Daniel

[mariacallous]

United States intelligence officials have been quietly issuing warnings to government agencies all summer about a rising threat of extremist violence tied to the 2024 presidential election, including plots to destroy bins full of paper ballots and promote "lone wolf" attacks against election facilities throughout the country.

In a series of reports between July and September, analysts at the Department of Homeland Security warned of a “heightened risk” of extremists carrying out attacks in response to the race. Copies of the reports, first reported by WIRED, describe efforts by violent groups to provoke attacks against election infrastructure and spread calls for the assassinations of lawmakers and law enforcement agents.

Last month, the agency’s intelligence office emphasized in a report that “perceptions of voter fraud” had risen to become a primary “trigger” for the “mobilization to violence.” This is particularly true, the report says, among groups working to leverage the “concept of a potential civil war.” Fears about “crimes by migrants or minorities” are among other top “triggers,” it says.

The documents show that DHS alerted dozens of agencies this summer to online chatter indicating potential attacks on election drop boxes—secured receptacles used in more than 30 states to collect mail-in voter ballots. The text highlights the efforts of an unnamed group to crowdsource information about “incendiary and explosive materials” capable of destroying the boxes and ballots. An extensive list of household mixtures and solvents, which are said to render voter ballots “impossible to process,” was also compiled by members of the group, the report says, and openly shared online.

“The United States remains in a heightened, dynamic threat environment and we continue to share information with our law enforcement partners about the threats posed by domestic violent extremists in the context of the 2024 election,” a spokesperson from DHS tells WIRED. "Violence has no place in our politics, and DHS continues to work with our partners to evaluate and mitigate emerging threats that may arise from domestic or foreign actors. DHS, through CISA, is also helping  election officials and election infrastructure partners bolster resilience in their cyber, physical, and operational security.  The Department continues to advise federal, state, and local partners to remain vigilant to potential threats and encourages the public to report any suspicious activity to local authorities."

The FBI, which is on a distribution list for several of the reports, declined to comment.

The reports were first obtained by Property of the People, a nonprofit focused on transparency and national security, under open records law. The reports contain details about how to commit crimes and avoid law enforcement, which WIRED is not publishing.

Wendy Via, cofounder and president of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE), says the conclusion reached by DHS matches the consensus of experts in the field: “Election denialism is going to be the primary motivator—if there is going to be violence.”

For decades, a growing number of states have adopted election drop boxes as a way to offer voters a dedicated, secure, and convenient way to submit voter ballots ahead of elections. Today, as many as 35 states allow drop boxes in some capacity, though a handful—nearly all southern—have outlawed their use, mostly over baseless claims about fraud and ballot stuffing. While drop boxes are no less secure than other forms of voting, Republicans have scrambled to block their use in key states, including Wisconsin, where Donald Trump blasted legislation expanding drop boxes as “only good for Democrats and cheating.” Via points to the Republican-led campaign aimed at banning and restricting access to election drop boxes in Wisconsin as a flash point for election denialism and possible violence.

The obsession with the otherwise mundane practice of dropping off ballots prior to election day stems in large part from the widely discredited film 2,000 Mules. The “documentary” depicts a shadowy network of operatives attempting to sway the 2020 election by stuffing ballots in Joe Biden’s favor; the film’s publisher, a conservative media company, has since issued an apology.

While the film’s evidence turned out to be false, it nevertheless provoked a surge of intimidation from far-right groups targeting drop-box voters and the officials defending their use. For the November election, some groups have committed to fundraising in order to surveil the boxes around the clock over public livestream. Others have hosted events near the locations to push conspiracy theories about immigrants. Election denial groups such as True the Vote, meanwhile, are working with myriad others across the country, as WIRED reported this summer, and are establishing a web of operations for waging legal warfare in the aftermath of the vote—if Trump fails to retake the White House a second time.

Spurious claims of voter fraud have remained a mainstay of the former president’s reelection efforts, with Trump preemptively and baselessly claiming that should he lose in November, the election will have been rigged. Claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen have been exhaustively investigated and debunked by countless judges and state election officials across the country. Property of the People executive director Ryan Shapiro says that though DHS does not mention the political leanings of the subjects in its reports, he believes “the documents make plain that US intelligence is bracing for election- and immigration-related violence from Trump's MAGA minions.”

The concerns of DHS today are reminiscent of warnings shared by the agency two years ago during the midterm elections. Similar bulletins leaked then showing fears among federal security officials that extremists would mount an attack, threaten poll workers, or sabotage infrastructure. The concerns proved largely unwarranted, outside of scattered instances of armed men in paramilitary gear showing up to “monitor” ballot boxes across Arizona—an effort quietly spearheaded in part by True the Vote, which helped make 2,000 mules, involving militias that included the American Patriots Three Percent, an anti-government group.

The election threats flagged in the reports by DHS appear to be growing more extreme over time. No longer restricted to aggressive surveillance and loitering outside polling locations, the risks associated by DHS with election fraud conspiracies today more closely resemble traditional acts of terrorism.

There are, however, some deterrents. The arrests and prosecutions of rioters involved in the January 6 attack on the United States Capitol building are credited by DHS, as well as groups such as GPAHE, with stifling much of the enthusiasm that far-rights groups once held for turning out in big numbers.

“In my lifetime of working in civil rights, the January 6 arrests are the only time I’ve ever seen an arrest or prosecution work as a deterrent,” says Via. “They really do not want to go to jail.”

[myriadxofxmuses]

MULTIMUSE QUESTIONAIRE

RULES: Answer the questions with the Muses that would best fit the answers. Bonus if you give details why.

1) Rank your softest Muse and your toughest Muse. (Personality-wise) Softest would be Ofreyja. She is naive in a lot of ways and her heart is always on her sleeve. She is just so open to everything that it's easy for others to take advantage of it.

Toughest is definitely Oscar. Hands down. His training, lack of fear, and determination see him through pretty much anything.

2) Which Muse would blow through $1000 quickly? Ivy. She does it all the time when she hacks people's credit cards. But don't worry. It's always people who deserve it. And they get the money back anyway when they claim it as fraud so there's no real damage. Plus Ivy is more than capable to cover her tracks to avoid detection, so it's a win for both parties.

3) Do any of them have nicknames? Is there a meaning behind them? Ethan is so affectionately called E or E-Heazey. Both of which he hates. And there isn't any real meaning behind them. Just his douche bag, yuppy friends and their typical frat boy behavior.

Gage had a few - Rage Gage, Turnstile, Messaih. Plus the usual entertainment bullshit of 'big man on campus', 'ladies man', etc. The ones that matter however have meaning behind each one. Rage Gage because he loved Tencious D growing up. Turnstile because he's a whore. And Messiah because his parents names are Mary and Joseph.

Ivy is known as 8bit-Cyanide to those involved in the cyber world. It's her handle.

Silas has been given two by his bandmates. Speedy and Tree Hugger. He got Speedy because of his addictions to both cocaine and sugar. And Tree Hugger because of his upbringing in a cult.

Emily has been affectionately named Vinny by her brother because of her love for Vincent Van Gogh. Plus it's so specific to them that it can also be used as a code word if needed - something Oscar likes to point out to her as often as possible.

She has affectionately named him Oscar the Grouch as a testimate to his serious nature.

4) Are any of them up-to-speed on the latest trends? Anyone more old school? Ofreyja, Gage, and Ivy are pretty up to date with trends. Emily and Oscar tend to be more old school. Ethan and Silas could honestly care less, but they don't need a whole lot of help staying on point with things. It comes naturally for them.

5) Who has the best relationship with their siblings? Emily and Oscar. But they barely beat out Gage and Celeste.

6) Karaoke night! Who is likely to grab the mic first and bust out a tune? Ivy. Usually when she's gotten tipsy enough to do so. And her voice isn't half bad either. Also Ofreyaja, but she's not that great. She just has fun with it.

7) Who is least likely to enter a beauty pageant/model? Emily, Oscar, and Sydney

8) If your Muses visited a haunted house where actors scare you, who would panic and who would be unfazed? Panic would be Oscar. It would trigger his PTSD and he knows it, so he avoids them. Unfazed is definitely Gage and Silas.

9) Are any of your Muses particular about taking certain modes of transportation? Gage loves older race cars, but he doesn't drive them much to keep them pristine. Other than that, no, not really.

10) Share a little-known fact about any Muse. Oscar can wiggle his ears.

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