Tag: documents
Woman who accuses Rudy Giuliani of sexual harassment files lurid legal documents
Terraform’s Do Kwon pleads not guilty to fake travel documents charges
Terraform Labs co-founder Do Kwon pleaded not guilty in a Montenegrin court on Thursday to a charge of forging his passport and travel documents. Kwon’s hearing comes a month after Kwon and Chang-joon Han, Kwon’s former colleague, who also pleaded not guilty, were arrested at the airport in Podgorica, the capital of Montenegro, while trying to […]
Terraform’s Do Kwon pleads not guilty to fake travel documents charges by Kate Park originally published on TechCrunch
China court documents incorrectly showed Activision was being sued by former partner NetEase
On April 24th, 2023, reports circulated that Blizzard Entertainment was being sued by former Chinese publishing partner NetEase after servers shutdown in January when the two failed to reach a continuation agreement. However, a day later, it turns out that NetEase was in fact not suing the company — instead, as reported by PC Gamer, the suit is being brought by a single individual who is known to be a serial litigant with no history with NetEase. It appears the court documents listened NetEase erroneously; the company does not have anything to do with the lawsuit. Originally, MMO-focused gaming website Wowhead noticed the suit.
Since this story was originally published, those court documents have been re-published to reflect that the suits are coming from a Yang Jun; all mentions of NetEase have been removed.
“We haven’t received the lawsuit yet, but we are confident we aren’t in breach of any licensing agreements. The terms NetEase appears to be complaining about reflect standard industry practice and have been mutually-beneficial for years,” an Activision rep wrote in a statement to Engadget prior to the discovery that NetEase was not involved in the lawsuit. “While this persistent campaign by one former partner is disappointing and puzzling, it’s important to note that we have enjoyed nearly two decades of positive experiences operating in China, and remain committed to serving players and protecting their interests.”
Blizzard and NetEase were successful partners for the past 14 years before negotiations broke down to renew the long-term licensing agreement. This led to a complete cessation of all Blizzard games and services in the region, including popular properties like World of Warcraft, Overwatch 2, Starcraft and Diablo III, among others. Millions of Chinese players lost access to their accounts and related data. Some started fresh with new accounts in other regions, but most (112 million people) opted for a refund.
The agreement did not end amicably, with reports of NetEase staffers tearing down the Blizzard offices and livestreaming the destruction of a World of Warcraft statue. NetEase’s president of global investment and partnership, Simon Zhu, also seemed to call out a high-ranking Blizzard staffer as a “jerk” in a LinkedIn post. Despite the seeming animosity, though, the lawsuit does not come from NetEase.
Update, 4/24/23, 3:30PM ET: This story and its headline have been updated to indicate that this lawsuit hasn’t been confirmed yet, as Activision itself nor Engadget has seen a copy of the lawsuit yet.
Update, 4/25/23, 11:30AM ET: A full statement provided by Activision has been added to the story.
Update, 4/25/23, 2:35PM ET: This story and its headline has been updated to reflect the recent development that NetEase was erroneously named in this lawsuit.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/china-court-documents-incorrectly-showed-activision-was-being-sued-by-former-partner-netease-183534200.html?src=rss
Leaker of US Documents Shared More Secrets Earlier in a Discord Group with 600 Members
The case against Airman Teixeira, 21, who was arrested on April 13, pertains to the leaking of classified documents on another Discord group of about 50 members, called Thug Shaker Central. There, he began posting sensitive information in October 2022, members of the group told The Times. His job as an information technology specialist at an Air Force base in Massachusetts gave him top secret clearance… The user claimed to be posting information from the National Security Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency and other intelligence agencies.
The additional information raises questions about why authorities did not discover the leaks sooner, particularly since hundreds more people would have been able to see the posts… The exposure of some of America’s most closely guarded secrets has prompted criticism about how the Pentagon and intelligence agencies protect classified data, and whether there are weaknesses in both vetting people for security clearances and enforcing the mantra that access to secrets should only be given to people with a “need to know.”
Unlike Thug Shaker Central, the second chat room was publicly listed on a YouTube channel and was easily accessed in seconds… Apparently eager to impress others in the group who questioned his analysis, he said: “I have a little more than open source info. Perks of being in a USAF intel unit,” referring to the United States Air Force… At times, he appeared to be posting from the military base where he was stationed… Airman Teixeira also claimed that he was actively combing classified computer networks for material on the Ukraine war.
When one of the Discord users urged him not to abuse his access to classified intelligence, Teixeira replied: “too late….”
The Times says they learned about the larger chat room “from another Discord user.”
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Who Is Jack Teixeira, the Man Accused of Leaking Pentagon Documents on Discord?
Last week, the U.S. government arrested a man accused of one the worst leaks of national security material in years.
Leaked Documents Show Russians Boasted Just 1% of Fake Social Profiles are Detected
“The Russian operators of those accounts boast that they are detected by social networks only about 1 percent of the time, one document says.”
That claim, described here for the first time, drew alarm from former government officials and experts inside and outside social media companies contacted for this article. “Google and Meta and others are trying to stop this, and Russia is trying to get better. The figure that you are citing suggests that Russia is winning,” said Thomas Rid, a disinformation scholar and professor at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies. He added that the 1 percent claim was likely exaggerated or misleading.
The undated analysis of Russia’s effectiveness at boosting propaganda on Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, Telegram and other social media platforms cites activity in late 2022 and was apparently presented to U.S. military leaders in recent months. It is part of a trove of documents circulated in a Discord chatroom and obtained by The Washington Post. Air National Guard technician Jack Teixeira was charged Friday with taking and transmitting the classified papers, charges for which he faces 15 years in prison…
Many of the 10 current and former intelligence and tech safety specialists interviewed for this article cautioned that the Russian agency whose claims helped form the basis for the leaked document may have exaggerated its success rate.
The leaked document was apparently prepared by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, U.S. Cyber Command and Europe Command, which directs American military activities in Europe. “It refers to signals intelligence, which includes eavesdropping, but does not cite sources for its conclusions,” the Post reports, describing the document as offering “a rare candid assessment by U.S. intelligence of Russian disinformation operations.”
The assessment concludes that foreign bots “view, ‘like,’ subscribe and repost content and manipulate view counts to move content up in search results and recommendation lists.” And the document says a Russian center’s disinformation network — working directly for Russia’s presidential administration — was still working on improvements as recently as late 2022 and expected to improve its ability to “promote pro-Russian narratives abroad.”
After Russia’s 2016 efforts to interfere in the U.S. presidential election, social media companies stepped up their attempts to verify users, including through phone numbers. Russia responded, in at least one case, by buying SIM cards in bulk, which worked until companies spotted the pattern, employees said. The Russians have now turned to front companies that can acquire less detectable phone numbers, the document says.
A separate top-secret document from the same Discord trove summarized six specific influence campaigns that were operational or planned for later this year by a new Russian organization, the Center for Special Operations in Cyberspace. The new group is mainly targeting Ukraine’s regional allies, that document said. Those campaigns included one designed to spread the idea that U.S. officials were hiding vaccine side effects, intended to stoke divisions in the West.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
New Leaked Documents on Discord Reveal More Chinese Spy Balloons
Based on the classified documents, the Post also reports that “questions lingered about the true capabilities of the one that flew over the continental United States in January and February.”
The Chinese spy balloon that flew over the United States this year, called Killeen-23 by U.S. intelligence agencies, carried a raft of sensors and antennas the U.S. government still had not identified more than a week after shooting it down, according to a document allegedly leaked to a Discord chatroom by Jack Teixeira, a member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard.
Another balloon flew over a U.S. carrier strike group in a previously unreported incident, and a third crashed in the South China Sea, a second top-secret document stated, though it did not provide specific information for launch dates…. [Chinese spy balloon] Bulger-21 carried sophisticated surveillance equipment and circumnavigated the globe from December 2021 until May 2022, the NGA document states. Accardo-21 carried similar equipment as well as a “foil-lined gimbaled” sensor, it says….
Annotating what appear to be detailed photos of the balloon that flew over the United States, presumably taken from a U-2 spy plane, intelligence analysts assessed that it could generate enough power to operate “any” surveillance and reconnaissance technology, including a type of radar that can see at night and through clouds and thin materials [including tarps]…. China’s military has operated a vast surveillance balloon project for several years, partly out of Hainan province off China’s south coast, U.S. officials have previously told The Post.
But the NGA document is notable as much for what it doesn’t say, reflecting the government’s possible lack of insight, at least in mid-February, into the balloons’ capabilities… The lack of detailed conclusions about the balloon’s surveillance capabilities raises questions about the decision to let it fly over the United States before shooting it down, an action the Defense Department justified at the time as an opportunity to collect additional intelligence.
The Post also reports that another leaked document (relying on intercepted communications) assessed that within the Chinese military the balloon surveillance program lacked “strong leadership” oversight.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Remember when top secret military documents leaking in a gaming community wasn’t a normal Tuesday?
Air National Guard member arrested in connection to Discord classified documents leak
The FBI has made an arrest in connection to a recent leak of classified documents that revealed sensitive details about the war in Ukraine and other US intelligence matters, apprehending a young Massachusetts Air National Guard member on Thursday, April 13th. 21-year-old Jack Teixeira, who holds the rank of airman first class, allegedly shared the files to a Discord server primarily dedicated to Minecraft. According to The Washington Post, he first transcribed the documents manually when he started sharing them late last year before posting photos of the classified materials themselves.
The Justice Department has arrested Jack Douglas Teixeira in connection with an investigation into “alleged unauthorized removal, retention, and transmission of classified national defense information,“ Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement issued by the Justice Department. As NBC News notes, public military records show that Texeira was assigned as a cyber transport systems journeyman at Otis Air National Guard Base on Cape Cod.
FBI Statement on today’s arrest of Jack Douglas Teixeira, of North Dighton, Massachusetts. pic.twitter.com/SC81ryuhRC
— FBI Boston (@FBIBoston) April 13, 2023
Based on the The Post’s investigation, Teixeira, who used the pseudonym “OG” on the Discord server, claimed he partly worked at a secure facility where phones and cameras are prohibited. That’s reportedly the reason why he originally copied the documents by hand before the lack of interaction on the server prompted him to post photographs of the original documents. Some of the photos contained random items and furniture that may have given investigators a clue on his identity.
Despite the sensitive information contained in the documents, the suspect apparently did not intend to be a whistleblower — according to The New York Times, members of “Thug Shaker Central,” the original Discord server, say the documents were never intended to be shared outside of their small group. Eventually, though, they were shared to other Discord servers before finding their way to Telegram channels, 4chan and other social media platforms.
The documents Teixeira had leaked included large amounts of information regarding the Russian invasion of Ukraine, including detailed battlefield conditions and missile strike maps for the latter. They also reportedly showed how Egypt had planned to sell Russia tens of thousands of rockets and how Russia approached Turkey, a NATO ally, to buy weapons. In addition, the documents apparently contained information showing how the US spies on its foreign allies.
Discord previously said that it was cooperating with authorities regarding their investigation on the leak. As for Teixeira, he will make his initial appearance in the US District Court for Massachusetts.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/air-national-guard-member-arrested-in-connection-to-discord-classified-documents-leak-025010308.html?src=rss