Virtually Islamic Blog

Gary R. Bunt

Mapping Podcast

There's an excellent podcast on mapping produced by the BBC, with intriguing elements on digital privacy and guerrilla mapping. Check it out! Discover More…

Across the #Cryptoleaks Rubicon

The cryptoleaks controversy decoded … Discover More…

Allegations on Security Flaws

Security flaws exploited Discover More…

Model Facebook citizen in Egypt

Mada Masr, three-step guide to becoming a model Facebook citizen in Egypt Discover More…

Pensacola attack

Collected links on the Pensacola attack: Discover More…

IS App Concerns

'Islamic State' app concerns Discover More…

KSA VPNs

Paul Bischoff, Comparitech, Are VPNs legal in Saudi Arabia? A common sense guide
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'IS' Off-Net (for now)

NPR, Islamic State 'Not Present On The Internet Anymore' Following European Operation
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Many Muslims listed by World-Check without evidence

Al Jazeera, Blacklist: Many Muslims listed by World-Check without evidence
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Balkan Radicalisation Issues

Emina Dizdarevic and Lamija Grebo, Balkan Insight, Bosnia Failing in Fight against Extremism Online
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Kashmir crisis

AP, Kashmir Enters Another Day Of India-Imposed Lockdown And Internet Blackout

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UN on 'IS'

Ben Makuch, Vice, ISIS Is Using Internet Propaganda to Maintain a 'Virtual Caliphate,' UN Report Says
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8chan

Joseph Cox, Vice, 8chan Forced to Move to Obscure Dark Web Service
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MI6 Recruitment Shift

Asian Tribune, MI6 -The previously two separate online and offline worlds are now one and the same
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US Cyber Power

9News, How US has aggressively flexed its cyber warfare powers under Trump

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Iran National Center of Virtual Space

Radio Farda, Iran Mulling 'Drills' To Deal With Any 'Threat' To Internet From U.S. Discover More…

'IS' analysis

Deutsche Welle, German intelligence agency warns of 'Islamic State' attacks
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CollabDeen Mosque Networking Product

Yahoo Finance/Accesswire, CollabDeen: The World's First Muslim-Friendly Social Technology Platform ['advertorial'/press-release]
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China Surveillance

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Under Surveillance?

Chip Rolley, Guardian, Opinion, Is Chinese-style surveillance coming to the west?

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Hamas 'Cyber HQ' attacked (allegedly)

Vice, Israel Bombing ‘Cyber Operatives’ Isn’t Cyber War, It’s Just War
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Cloudflare Profile

Sean Captain, Fast Company, How Cloudflare straddles roles as free speech champion and hate speech enabler Discover More…

DDoS

CJR, A new group devoted to transparency is exposing secrets Wikileaks chose to keep Discover More…

Iran 'hacking threat'

Axios, Report: A new Iranian threat focuses on personal information
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Tor

Wired, Tor Is Easier Than Ever. Time to Give It a Try
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Israel's software helps KSA - allegation

NYT, Israeli Software Helped Saudis Spy on Khashoggi, Lawsuit Says
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French police raid Centre Zahra France

Daily Star (Lebanon), French police raid Shiite center in counterterror swoop, 3 Oct 2018

"One Zahra France official cited in the order to freeze funds, Yahia Gouasmi, 68, told CNews TV channel that the weapons were solely “for the security of the center” and mainly belonged to Zahra France’s security detail.

"“Everything is false,” said Jamel Tahiri, 43, also among the four whose funds were being frozen.

"“We’re transparent. Everything is on internet.”"

Saudi Arabia Seeks Death Penalty Against Prominent Cleric

Bloomberg.com, Saudi Arabia Seeks Death Penalty Against Prominent Cleric, 4 September 2018 "Salman Al-Odah was detained in September 2017. Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir said at the time that the roundup of a diverse group of clerics, businessmen and intellectuals had targeted people who were “pushing an extremist agenda” with the help of foreign funding." Analysis/commentary.
I discuss Al-Odah in 'Hashtag Islam'.

Lessons From ISIS: Using the Internet for Counter-Terrorism

The Quint, Lessons From ISIS: Using the Internet for Counter-Terrorism "Bloom and Daymon in their research paper titled ‘Assessing the Future Threat: ISIS’s Virtual Caliphate’ join a chorus of other researchers such as Charlie Winter and Haroro J Ingram from the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT) at The Hague in highlighting how ISIS has, by design and impeccable execution, changed the way the internet can be used for radicalisation.."

I discuss similar themes in 'Hashtag Islam'.

Also see
Mia Bloom and Chelsea Daymon, Assessing the Future Threat: ISIS's Virtual Caliphate

Saudi and Amazon Deploy Twitter bots

albawaba, Manufacturing Consent: Saudi and Amazon Deploy Twitter Bots to Insist They Are Virtuous, 26 August 2018
opinion/analysis (with a nod to Chomsky): "The contemporary media landscape is experiencing a shift: as news is increasingly shared through and understood by social media, powerful companies and countries are exploiting loopholes to create hordes of accounts tweeting along regime and corporate lines. In so doing, manufacture an image of consent and create an air of doubt whenever a damaging report surfaces."
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