Military operatives were part of an operation that targeted politicians and high-profile journalists who raised doubts about the official pandemic response. A shadowy Army unit secretly spied on British citizens who criticised the Government’s Covid lockdown policies, The Mail on Sunday can reveal. Military operatives in the UK’s ‘information warfare’ brigade were part of a sinister operation that targeted politicians and high-profile journalists who raised doubts about the official pandemic response. They compiled dossiers on public figures such as ex-Minister David Davis, who questioned the modelling behind alarming death toll predictions, as well as journalists such as Peter Hitchens and Toby Young. Their dissenting views were then reported back to No 10. Documents obtained by the civil liberties group Big Brother Watch, and shared exclusively with this newspaper, exposed the work of Government cells such as the Counter Disinformation Unit, based in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, and the Rapid Response Unit in the Cabinet Office. But the most secretive is the MoD’s 77th Brigade, which deploys ‘non-lethal engagement and legitimate non-military levers as a means to adapt behaviours of adversaries’. According to a whistleblower who worked for the brigade during the lockdowns, the unit strayed far beyond its remit of targeting foreign powers. They said that British citizens’ social media accounts were scrutinised – a sinister activity that the Ministry of Defence, in public, repeatedly denied doing. Papers show the outfits were tasked with countering ‘disinformation’ and ‘harmful narratives… from purported experts’, with civil servants and artificial intelligence deployed to ‘scrape’ social media for keywords such as ‘ventilators’ that would have been of interest.
Military operatives were part of an operation that targeted politicians and high-profile journalists who raised doubts about the official pandemic response. A shadowy Army unit secretly spied on British citizens who criticised the Government’s Covid lockdown policies, The Mail on Sunday can reveal. Military operatives in the UK’s ‘information warfare’ brigade were part of a sinister operation that targeted politicians and high-profile journalists who raised doubts about the official pandemic response. They compiled dossiers on public figures such as ex-Minister David Davis, who questioned the modelling behind alarming death toll predictions, as well as journalists such as Peter Hitchens and Toby Young. Their dissenting views were then reported back to No 10. Documents obtained by the civil liberties group Big Brother Watch, and shared exclusively with this newspaper, exposed the work of Government cells such as the Counter Disinformation Unit, based in the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, and the Rapid Response Unit in the Cabinet Office. But the most secretive is the MoD’s 77th Brigade, which deploys ‘non-lethal engagement and legitimate non-military levers as a means to adapt behaviours of adversaries’. According to a whistleblower who worked for the brigade during the lockdowns, the unit strayed far beyond its remit of targeting foreign powers. They said that British citizens’ social media accounts were scrutinised – a sinister activity that the Ministry of Defence, in public, repeatedly denied doing. Papers show the outfits were tasked with countering ‘disinformation’ and ‘harmful narratives… from purported experts’, with civil servants and artificial intelligence deployed to ‘scrape’ social media for keywords such as ‘ventilators’ that would have been of interest.
Der Staatsschutz ermittelt gegen einen mutmaßlichen Bremer Rechtsextremisten. Er soll in mehreren Posts die rund 15 Mitglieder einer Chat-Gruppe dazu aufgefordert haben, zeitnah einen “Nazi-Stützpunkt” in Nordrhein-Westfalen aufzubauen. Er habe sich selbst als “Nazi” bezeichnet. Spezialeinsatzkräfte durchsuchten am Donnerstag die Wohnung des Mannes, dabei stellten sie Waffen und digitale Beweismittel sicher. (…) Ermittelt werde wegen des Verdachts der Verwendung von Kennzeichen verfassungswidriger Organisationen und der Aufforderung zu Straftaten. Der 32-Jährige soll als Administrator in der offen zugänglichen Chat-Gruppe seit November 2022 mehrere strafrechtlich relevante Posts veröffentlicht haben
Der Staatsschutz ermittelt gegen einen mutmaßlichen Bremer Rechtsextremisten. Er soll in mehreren Posts die rund 15 Mitglieder einer Chat-Gruppe dazu aufgefordert haben, zeitnah einen “Nazi-Stützpunkt” in Nordrhein-Westfalen aufzubauen. Er habe sich selbst als “Nazi” bezeichnet. Spezialeinsatzkräfte durchsuchten am Donnerstag die Wohnung des Mannes, dabei stellten sie Waffen und digitale Beweismittel sicher. (…) Ermittelt werde wegen des Verdachts der Verwendung von Kennzeichen verfassungswidriger Organisationen und der Aufforderung zu Straftaten. Der 32-Jährige soll als Administrator in der offen zugänglichen Chat-Gruppe seit November 2022 mehrere strafrechtlich relevante Posts veröffentlicht haben
Daniel Harris faces jail after being convicted of publishing terrorist material from his grandfather’s house in Glossop A teenage extremist from Derbyshire inspired the suspect accused of killing five people and wounding 17 others in a mass shooting at a gay nightclub in the US, a judge has been told. Daniel Harris, 19, is facing jail after being convicted of publishing far-right terrorist material from his grandfather’s spare bedroom in Glossop. The teenager, who went by the name of BookAnon online, produced videos that called for an armed uprising and celebrated white supremacist murderers including Anders Breivik. Manchester crown court has previously been told that Harris’s videos were viewed by Payton Gendron, the 19-year-old who killed 10 people in a racially motivated attack in Buffalo, New York, last May. The judge, Patrick Field KC, was told at a sentencing hearing on Thursday that the material had also been watched by Anderson Lee Aldrich, 22, the suspect accused of a deadly nightclub shooting in Colorado Springs last November. Harris is facing 12 years in prison and possible extradition to the US after being convicted of five terrorism offences relating to extreme rightwing videos he uploaded to the internet. He was also found guilty of possessing a 3D printer, which he tried to use to make parts of a firearm.
Fuentes’s latest ban comes hours after he shared a post amplifying rapper Kanye West’s antisemitic statements. On Tuesday, Twitter reinstated the account of Nick Fuentes, a white supremacist who has given high praise to Nazi leader Adolf Hitler as recently as last week — only to suspend Fuentes’s profile within 24 hours of its reinstatement. The site has not specified why it suspended Fuentes’s account for a second time, but one of the few tweets Fuentes shared while back on the platform referenced antisemitic remarks from rapper Kanye West in which he vowed to go “death con 3” on Jewish people. (…) Fuentes became more well known after he, rapper Kanye West and former President Donald Trump had dinner at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in November. After Trump was criticized for agreeing to meet with him and West, who also espouses far right, antisemitic viewpoints, he tried to distance himself from Fuentes, saying he didn’t know who the white supremacist was before the dinner took place. (Notably, Trump has not condemned Fuentes after the fact, as he is reportedly worried that doing so would alienate his base of supporters.)
Das Oberlandesgericht Wien bestätigte die langjährigen Haftstrafen wegen NS-Wiederbetätigung für ein Brüderpaar. Der Verteidiger führte davor originelle Argumente an. Das Sakrileg, den Namen eines britischen Ornithologen zu verwenden, um in Liedern neonazistisches Gedankengut zu verbreiten, ist im österreichischen Strafrecht natürlich kein Erschwerungsgrund. Deshalb wurde der als “Mr. Bond” agierende Philip H. aber auch nicht wegen nationalsozialistischer Wiederbetätigung zu zehn Jahren Haft verurteilt. Sondern da er rassistische, homophobe, antisemitische Lieder produzierte – eines davon spielte der rechtsextreme Attentäter von Halle, als er bei seinem mittels Helmkamera live gestreamten Anschlag 2019 zwei Menschen tötete und zwei verletzte. Dass die Verurteilung an sich korrekt ist, hat der Oberste Gerichtshof bereits entschieden. Im Saal F des Wiener Justizpalastes geht es vor dem Oberlandesgericht nun um die Berufung gegen die Strafhöhe. Philip H.s ebenso unbescholtener Bruder Benjamin, der im Internet eine “Feindesliste” namens “Judas Watch” publizierte, auf der über 1.700 Personen namentlich genannt wurden, darunter auch STANDARD-Mitarbeiterinnen und -Mitarbeiter, hatte vier Jahre ausgefasst. (…) Der Berufung wird nicht Folge geleistet. Bei Philip H. sei die “besondere Gefährlichkeit” sowohl bei der Wiederbetätigung als auch beim Täter selbst gegeben, zeigt sich das Oberlandesgericht sicher. Letzteres werde beispielsweise dadurch illustriert, dass er nach den Anschlägen auf zwei Moscheen in Christchurch, bei denen ein Rechtsterrorist 51 Menschen ermordete und 50 weitere verletzte, postete “I love this guy” und wenige Tage später dessen Pamphlet ins Deutsche übersetzte und online stellte. Auch nach dem Attentat von Halle habe er zeitnah im Internet recherchiert, wie man sich mittels 3D-Drucker selbstgemachte Schusswaffen besorgen könne