Fact checkers expose alleged news site run by far-right media company

The French website's name was very similar to that of a mainstream news site. EU DisinfoLab, in cooperation with newsroom fact-checkers, has uncovered a far-right Polish media operation running a website that was making slight changes to real, existing stories and re-posting them to sow discord. The non-governmental organization, which collaborates with newsrooms throughout the European Union to combat misinformation, discovered the alleged news site after being contacted by fact-checkers from Agence France-Presse. Roman Adamczyk, research coordinator for EU DisinfoLab, told ABC News he saw an article from AFP fact-checkers about false information spread by a website called France Libre 24. That article triggered an alarm after the EU DisinfoLab also saw suspicious activity from the same site.
Adamczyk said a quick review of the site set off alarm bells for him. "First, because it was using a name close to France 24, which is a real mainstream media in France," he said. "Then, we had a closer look at the content and we realized that a lot of articles in the website focused on polarizing topics such as identity, immigration, religion." Adamczyk told ABC News that the articles cited mainstream media sources but were rewritten to change their meanings.

via abcnews: Fact checkers expose alleged news site run by far-right media company

#Hitlergrüße und #Platzverweis bei #AfD-Demo in #Rostock

Mehr als 650 Polizisten waren am Montagabend im Einsatz, um rund 220 AfD-Anhänger und etwa 450 Gegendemonstranten voneinander zu trennen. Partei-intern brodelt es bei den Rostocker Rechtspopulisten. Aus den Boxen dröhnt Musik der Böhsen Onkelz. Einige der rund 220 Demonstranten der Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) tanzen ausgelassen dazu. Die Stimmung schaukelt sich hoch, einer der Teilnehmer zeigt den Hitlergruß. Mit seiner anderen Hand klammert er sich an seine Deutschland-Fahne. Er winkt fröhlich in die Menge. Es ist nicht der einzige ausgestreckte Arm an diesem Abend. Die Polizei ermittelt nach eigenen Angaben in mehreren Fällen. Insgesamt sind am Montag fast 670 Beamte im Rostocker Stadtteil Evershagen im Einsatz gewesen, um die AfD-Anhänger und die rund 450 Gegendemonstranten voneinander fern zu halten

via otz: Hitlergrüße und Platzverweis bei AfD-Demo in Rostock

Ahead of Richmond Rally, Apple and Google Are Letting Nazis Use This App to Coordinate

Telegram, which has banned ISIS content, remains a favored tool of white supremacists. Neo-nazi and fascist groups have been posting antisemitic and racist messages and calls for violence on the encrypted messaging app Telegram in advance of a massive gun rally in Richmond, Virginia, on Monday that far-right extremists are expected to attend and that officials fear might turn violent. (...) On sites like 4chan and other forums popular with internet racists, there’s little that can be done to stop neo-Nazis and white supremacists from posting and organizing. But in the case of Telegram, though, Google and Apple have the power to curb neo-Nazi communications if they choose to. (...) Both companies have rules for apps in their app stores that Telegram aggressively and frequently violates. Instead of enforcing these policies, the companies have stood idle as extremist groups have taken advantage of their inaction to communicate, organize, recruit, and rally allies and members on Telegram. As these groups prepare to descend on Richmond where they’ve called for violence, Apple and Google have the ability to take away a potentially critical organizing and communication tool. (...) Overall though, hundreds of openly hateful groups, many of which implicitly or overtly call for violence, are still operating unfettered on Telegram, according to one list of Neo-Nazi Telegram channels Mother Jones reviewed. It’s unclear why both companies have neglected to enforce their own platform policies on Telegram. Apple told Mother Jones that it is looking into the issue, and said that developers are responsible for moderating their own content. The company noted that it would notify the developer and work with them to address the issues and potentially remove the app if a solution isn’t reached. Google declined to comment. Telegram did not respond to a request for comment.

via motherjones: Ahead of Richmond Rally, Apple and Google Are Letting Nazis Use This App to Coordinate

#Richmond Gun Rally: Is A #Virginia #Cop Giving #4Chan’s /pol Board Inside Info?

On Monday, January 20, the city of Richmond, Virginia will be host to a massive gathering of militias and individual gun owners, protesting against a series of proposed bills in the state legislature. This event started as the annual “Lobby Day” rally for the Virginia Citizens Defense League (VCDL) but has quickly gotten out of control. Earlier this week, the FBI arrested several members of Neo-Nazi organization “The Base” who were planning to attend the march with an illegal automatic weapon and more than a thousand rounds of ammunition. Governor Northam has declared a “State of Emergency” in the city and banned firearms from the Capitol grounds. He justified this by stating his fear that some protesters attending the event, “have as their purpose not peaceful assembly but violence, rioting, and insurrection.” Evidence supporting this fear can be found on 4chan’s far-right /pol board, where at least one Richmond police officer appears to be providing protesters with inside information.
4chan’s /pol board is one of the largest white nationalist gathering places on the Internet. In the lead up to this much-anticipated rally a series of threads titled “/vsg/” (Virginian Spring General) have cropped up to help coordinate anons interested in attending the event. The posts range from general information… …to outright calls for racial violence and the start to a “boogaloo” (far-right terminology for a new civil war. As in, ‘Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo’). MediaMatters previously reported on some of these threads and noted: “…users have explicitly organized among themselves for the January 20 rally and have asked about “a meeting spot for anons that are showing up.” In one thread, users discussed which users would be “command[ing]” a “station” to “serve” at the rally and having an “alert for weapons free,” a term meaning permission to shoot at non-friendly targets.”
A Law Enforcement Officer Appears An anti-fascist activist, “B”, reached out to Bellingcat with a link to this archived version of a now-removed /vsg/ thread. In it, an individual with the poster ID “6RuLcY2g” claims to be a Richmond cop working the event and announces that he will be “taking questions”. Shortly thereafter, he posts a picture of his badge next to a crude approximation of the 4chan logo. This in and of itself is not hugely noteworthy. In other /vsg/ threads, users have posted pretending to be law enforcement officers. They have even posted pictures of badges, like this: This “investigator” badge is quite easily debunked as a fake via Google Image Search. But this Richmond police officer badge does not show up on Yandex or Google reverse image searches. And based on this tweet from the Richmond police, the badge posted onto /pol does seem to match the badges issued by the Richmond Police Department.

via bellingcat: Richmond Gun Rally: Is A Virginia Cop Giving 4Chan’s /pol Board Inside Info?

https://twitter.com/discord__panic/status/1219134644475650049

Nazi salute at Wanaka rodeo

A man attending the Wānaka Rodeo has been photographed giving the Nazi salute to a group of protesters in an act that a protest spokeswoman says shows "what kinds of people go to rodeos". The Wānaka Sun reported that the incident occurred on January 2, when a small group staged a protest outside the event. A man, who had two children in his vehicle, allegedly stopped and screamed "I'm a Nazi, I'm a Nazi" at the protesters, while holding his arm in a Nazi salute. Katherine Gollop, president of the Queenstown Vegan Society and spokeswoman for the protest group, said the man's acts were "very disturbing". "He was laughing a lot and shouting random things at us. Then he lifted both hands off the wheel to put one across his face like Hitler's moustache, then one arm up in the salute, whilst screaming 'I'm a Nazi' at us," she told the Wānaka Sun. "It just goes to show what kind of people go to rodeos and enjoy these types of events.

via otago daily times: Nazi salute at Wanaka rodeo

Far-right violence in Portugal draws strength from skinhead roots – study

Far-right agitators in Portugal now have different reasons to their 1970s predecessors for becoming radicalised and committing acts of political violence – a new study shows. Influenced by the international ‘skinhead’ movement from the mid-1980s, current extremists drawn largely from the working classes have turned to violence to ‘protect’ white Portugal and Europe against the ‘threat’ posed by multi-racial and multicultural society. Radicalised by the 13-year Colonial War, which started in 1961, and the revolutionary leadership’s behaviour after the 1974 April Revolution, their predecessors were active in politically violent organisations aimed at stopping the advance of Communism in Portugal and safeguarding the Portuguese multi-racial and pluri-continental empire. Researchers at the University of Birmingham and Lisbon University Institute (ISCTE) have published their findings in Perspectives on Terrorism. Their findings coincide with publication of a comprehensive Western European right-wing extremism database. They note that far-right political violence in Portugal could be found in two different periods: transition from authoritarianism to democracy (between 25 April 1974 and the mid-1980s) and from the second half of the 1980s to the present. (...) The researchers discovered that the Movimento de Acção Nacional / National Action Movement (MAN) was key in uniting nationalist militants and skinheads. The authorities dismantled MAN, but it was replaced by the Portugal Hammerskins (PHS).

via scienceblog: Far-right violence in Portugal draws strength from skinhead roots – study

Filterblase: AfD- und Nicht-Wähler nutzen die wenigsten News-Quellen

Das Internet bringt mit sich, dass eine Vielzahl von Informationsquellen bereitsteht, aber nicht alle nutzen diese Möglichkeit, so entstehen Filter­blasen. Eine Untersuchung will jetzt zeigen: Nicht- und AfD-Wähler sowie junge Erwachsene sind häufig von dem Phänomen betroffen. Durch die Vorselektion von Internetdiensten, die Inhalte an das Nutzerverhalten anpassen, können sehr schnell Filterblasen entstehen - es wird nur noch das angezeigt, was den Nutzer nach Meinung der Algorithmen auch wirklich interessiert. Auch Social Media verstärkt den Trend, Inhalte auszuliefern, die zur Meinung der Nutzer passen. Doch welcher Teil der Gesellschaft ist von diesen Informations-Echokammern am meisten betroffen? Genau dieser Frage hat sich jetzt ein Team von Psychologen der Universität Ulm angenommen. Die Grundannahme: "Die Anzahl der konsumierten Nachrichtenquellen und die Kategorie dieser Kanäle (Newsfeed, Online-Nachrichtenseite, Printmedium, TV usw.) können Hinweise auf das Risiko geben, in eine Blase oder Echokammer zu geraten." Ein Ergebnis der Befragung: Personen, die die AfD, eine sonstige Partei (Parteien deutlich unter der 5-Prozent-Hürde) oder gar nicht wählen, "geben die niedrigste Anzahl konsumierter Nachrichtenquellen an". Die Studien-Macher weiter: "Im Vergleich zu anderen Probandinnen und Probanden zeigen AfD-Wähler zudem die höchsten Werte bei autoritären Einstellungen." Dieser Zusammenhang zu Persönlichkeitsmerkmalen zeigt sich auch im Umkehrschluss: "Was ihre Persönlichkeit angeht, scheinen Personen, die mehrere unterschiedliche Quellen nutzen im Vergleich offener und weniger autoritär eingestellt zu sein", so die Schlussfolgerung. Unabhängig von der politischen Einstellung sehen die Forscher vor allem bei jungen Erwachsenen mit einem Durchschnittsalter von 24 Jahren, ein hohes Risiko, in Filterblasen zu geraten

via winfuture: Filterblase: AfD- und Nicht-Wähler nutzen die wenigsten News-Quellen

siehe auch: AfD- und Nichtwähler nutzen wenig Nachrichtenquellen. Forscher der Uni Ulm haben den Zusammenhang von Alter, Parteienpräferenz und anderen Merkmalen mit der Nutzung von Nachrichtenquellen untersucht. Nicht- und AfD-Wähler sowie Unterstützer von kleinen Parteien, die üblicherweise unter "sonstige" summiert werden, nutzen die wenigsten Nachrichtenquellen. Sie könnten somit in einer Blase gefangen sein, haben Psychologinnen und Psychologen der Universität Ulm durch eine Umfrage ermittelt. Insgesamt hätten junge Menschen, die sich ausschließlich über Newsfeeds sozialer Medien informieren, ein vergleichsweise hohes Risiko, in eine Filterblase oder Echokammer zu geraten. (...) Ältere Teilnehmende nutzen insgesamt mehr Nachrichtenquellen als jüngere, hat die Studie weiter ergeben. Zudem konsumieren Männer mehr Informationskanäle als Frauen. Personen, die mehrere unterschiedliche Quellen nutzen, scheinen vergleichsweise offener und weniger autoritär eingestellt zu sein. (...) In einem neuen Projekt wollen die Forscher der Uni Ulm untersuchen, ob das Erkennen von "Fake News" im Gegensatz zu "wahren Nachrichten" ebenfalls mit dem Nachrichtenkonsum zusammenhängt. Die Datenerhebung ist bereits angelaufen und steht Interessierten zur Teilnahme offen

Figure 3Mean Values and SEs (+/- 1 SE) of the number of news sources consumed in total split by voter groups; *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001 ; https://www.cell.com/heliyon/fulltext/S2405-8440(20)30059-1?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS2405844020300591%3Fshowall%3Dtrue
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