Weekly round-up of cognitive security-related articles from the Washington Post.
Disinformation campaign targeting Roy Moore’s Senate bid may have violated law, Alabama attorney general says
Craig Timberg and Tony Romm, Washington Post, December 27th, 2018
Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said Thursday that his office is exploring whether disinformation tactics deployed against Republican Roy Moore during last year’s special election violated state campaign laws and said he was worried that the operation could have affected the closely fought Senate race.
Democrats used Russian tactics in Alabama. Now they must swear them off.
Editorial, Washington Post, December 27th, 2018
The victims of social media manipulation have become the attackers. A New York Times article detailing how a group of Democrats borrowed Russian tactics in last year’s Senate race in Alabama is an ominous development in a dawning age of information warfare.
How Russia’s military intelligence agency became the covert muscle in Putin’s duels with the West
Anton Troianovski and Ellen Nakashima, Washington Post, December 28th, 2018
Nina Loguntsova arrives at school early to stand at soldier-style attention, and she leaves late after extra classes that have included cryptography. Three different military uniforms hang in her closet. The 17-year-old student is part of an expanding military-education program at Moscow’s public schools that aims to inculcate respect for security services and boost the math and computer knowledge of potential recruits.
Fake-porn videos are being weaponized to harass and humiliate women: ‘Everybody is a potential target’
Drew Harwell, Washington Post, December 30th, 2018
The video showed the woman in a pink off-the-shoulder top, sitting on a bed, smiling a convincing smile. It was her face. But it had been seamlessly grafted, without her knowledge or consent, onto someone else’s body: a young pornography actress, just beginning to disrobe for the start of a graphic sex scene. A crowd of unknown users had been passing it around online.
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