Beneath Mark Zuckerberg's crocodile tears apology to at least 50 million users of Facebook, there is a deeper secret of the mysterious Cambridge Analytica firm that is hardly being talked about.
Don't believe the fake apology, Facebook knew that Cambridge Analytica was misusing users data for years, QZ reported.
What the hell is Cambridge Analytica? Is it just some marketing firm harvesting your data?
No, the truth about the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica scandal lies within its parent firm. The company is actually a U.S. subsidiary (SHELL COMPANY) of a UK defense contractor SCL Group, Strategic Communication Laboratories a military contractor for military propaganda who works closely with NATO, the U.S. State Department. the CIA, and other defense contractors both in the U.S. and UK and probably other parts of the world.
"SCL Group provides data, analytics and strategy to governments and military organisations worldwide" reads the first line of its website. "For over 25 years, we have conducted behavioural change programmes in over 60 countries & have been formally recognised for our work in defence and social change.”
Speaking of Cambridge Analytica's SCL ties to the U.S. State Department the firm was awarded contracts last year (2017) to help reboot the U.S. State Department’s new Global Engagement Center, previously called the Center for Strategic Counter-terrorism Communications (CSCC) in an effort to aid the fight against ISIS recruitment, NBC reported.
It's worth noting that the UK Ministry of Defense (MoD) the equivalent of USA’s DARPA, conducted a study in 2013 called ‘Project DUCO’ which contracted SCL and to test out the firms TAA (Target Audience Analysis) capabilities.
Project Duco was part of the government’s “human and social influence” work, and SCL was paid £150,000 for its work accessing how Target Audience Analysis (TAA) could “contribute to the government’s strategic communications.”
SCL carries a Secret clearance as a ‘List X’ contractor for the British Ministry of Defence and has worked for private contractors in Iran, Libya, and Syria according to its faq.
The SCL even taught behavioral change science at a NATO-affiliated training program years prior.
Surprisingly the firm has none other than Steven Bannon the former Trump administration adviser and campaign political strategist on its board of directors.
Trump's former political strategist isn't the only one on the board. ‘Board members include an array of Lords, Tory donors, ex-British army officers and defense contractors according to Liam O Hare in a report that Julian Assange promoted shortly before having his internet shut off.
Assange quoted the article:
“We finally have the most concrete evidence yet of shadowy actors using dirty tricks in order to rig elections. But these characters aren’t operating from Moscow... Instead, they are British, Eton educated, ... and have close ties to Her Majesty," Assange tweeted.
Assange also hinted at having data on Cambridge Analytica and other affairs shortly before he had his communication rights taken away.
"I have accepted a request by the select committee of the UK parliament@CommonsCMS to give evidence, via video link, about Cambridge Analytica, and other matters, later this month," Assange tweeted.
Bannon as a result used the firm and his ties to help get Trump elected. The company was further employed by the Leave campaign during the UK’s referendum on EU membership.
Cambridge Analytica was funded by American billionaire Robert Mercer, who, with the help of Wylie, Trump campaign manager Steve Bannon, and the company’s chief executive Alexander Nix, deployed tools on the American population during the 2016 election, Guardian reported.
Of course, military propaganda is nothing new it was used to get into the Iraq war with a fake dossier on WMDs that was an academic copy paste job, and Afghanistan according to Michael Hastings who reported that the U.S. senate had been a victim of psywarfare (psychological warfare) which was used against them by MISOC (Military Information Support Operations Command). (Which by the way, is illegal to manipulate Congress into a war, on so many levels but that's a story for another time.)
The MISOC government program is similar to journalism, used to spread spun information, that shapes the narrative, according to Colonel Curtis D. Boyd, Chief of Staff of the JFK Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg, who gave a lecture on “The MISTRY* of PSYOP: Putting MISO in Perspective” in 2011.
Although, Cambridge Analytica doesn't appear to be manipulating citizens to garner support for war instead they garner support for their candidates as a political consulting firm. However, as more information comes to light that may change if you are reading this article months from now.
What is significant is that MISO and Cambridge Analytica (SCL) share the same ideals and work similarly.
“Military Information Support Operations (MISO), previously known as Psychological Operations (PSYOP), uses themes and messages to reach target audiences in order to influence their emotions, motives, reasoning, and ultimately the behavior of foreign governments, organizations, groups, and individuals.” – Reaching The Target Audience, a thesis presented to the Faculty of the U.S. Army Command.
In other words Cambridge Analytica dissected human reactions to certain posts and analyzed individual users' data to allow better targeting of individual voters during elections.
Chief Executive of Cambridge Analytica, Alexander Nix happily accepted the role of his firm in meddling in the U.S. election as he said.
“CA was able to provide the campaign with predictive analytics based on more than 5,000 data points on every voter in the United States. From there, CA’s team of political consultants and psychologists guided the campaign on what to say and how to say it to specific groups of voters.”
Completely unrelated or perhaps more related then we realize also present in Iraq was a specialized British Armed Forces tri-service unit, the 15 (UK) Psychological Operations Group, formerly known as Shadow.
The groups' stated objective was to “influence attitudes in order to affect behavior” with “planned, culturally sensitive, truthful and attributable activities directed and disseminated by various means to an approved target audience.” Taking influence from the Army, Navy & Air Force, seeking out Reserves who were also “TV & film producers, camera operators, radio presenters, and graphic designers/illustrators for print/web.”
In 2015, the UK military formed the 77th Brigade which included the 15 PSYOPs Group Shadow, of particular interest is the note of utilizing social media to wage the ‘dark arts’ of asymmetric warfare, but its №1 Column focuses on “the behavioural analysis of actors, audiences and adversaries.”
Cambridge Analytica is accused of having purchased user data from a company called Global Science Research, creators of an app called thisisyourdigitallife, developed by Cambridge psychologist Aleksandr Kogan. (The university has no connections with Cambridge Analytica).
A whistleblower 28-year-old Christopher Wylie went on the record with the Guardian to discuss his role in hijacking the profiles of millions of Facebook users in order to target the U.S. election, and creating “Steve Bannon’s psychological warfare mindfuck tool.”
That's not all that the scandal has revealed, it revealed that the firm is much more than a social media analysis company.
A reporter for the UK TV station Channel 4 posed as a Sri Lankan hoping to enlist Cambridge Analytica’s services for a client aiming to win a local election.
What was revealed was a darker secret the firm or deepstate doesn't only operate online. Cambridge Analytica also operates offline using dirty tactics to help their clients win, the company was filmed offering illegal political intimidation services to its prospective clients, suggesting bribery and blackmail involving sex workers.
But it doesn't end there, the firm also suggested - fake news campaigns and operations with ex-spies to "swing election campaigns" using the data they obtained.
It is also now being reported that the firm was used to rescue ousted Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's political career.
Cambridge Analytica parent company SCL was recently hired to change the mindset and behavior of the Ukrainian people against Russia by the Ukrainian government.
The company was hired to push "localized communications campaigns" to assist Kiev's efforts to try to win back control of eastern Ukraine's breakaway Donbass region, a detailed investigation by British TV broadcaster Channel revealed, BBC reported.
Cambridge Analytica also claims to have helped the Orange Revolution in 2004 in Ukraine which helped bring the pro-Western President Viktor Yushchenko to power.
The company’s executives were also filmed presenting the results of their operations within Kenya, where they say they worked to get current president Uhuru Kenyatta elected twice first in 2013, then again in 2017, handling his entire campaign.
One has to question how many other more countries' elections Cambridge Analytica manipulated and was enlisted for their "services" for that we aren't being told about, or at least haven't been made public yet.
Especially with the comment Alexander Nix gave the Channel 4 reporter, “We’re used to operating through different vehicles, in the shadows, and I look forward to building a very long-term and secretive relationship with you."
I don't know about you, but that's not a company I would trust you only need secrets if you are doing something wrong.
Cambridge Analytica states on its website it supports more than 100 campaigns across five continents, while its SCL parent company has been involved in similar operations going back to the 1990's.
Further, one has to wonder not only how many elections the firm has manipulated but also how much disinformation is out there due to this one firm alone?
“We just put information into the bloodstream of the internet, and then, and then watch it grow, give it a little push every now and again … like a remote control. It has to happen without anyone thinking, ‘that’s propaganda’, because the moment you think ‘that’s propaganda’, the next question is, ‘who’s put that out?’," Mark Turnbull, the company’s managing director said.
The company denied any wrongdoing stating that it “routinely undertake[s] conversations with prospective clients to try to tease out any unethical or illegal intentions.” “In playing along with this line of conversation, and partly to spare our ‘client’ from embarrassment, we entertained a series of ludicrous hypothetical scenarios,” Nix said in a release. “I must emphatically state that Cambridge Analytica does not condone or engage in entrapment, bribes or so-called ‘honeytraps’, and nor does it use untrue material for any purpose.”
Interestingly enough looking into Mark Turnbull eventually you will come up with an investigative piece into his former employment at a public relations and strategic communications company called Bell Pottinger Public Advocacy.
In 2011, a UK nonprofit watchdog the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, conducted an investigation into Turnbull’s BPPA, in which Bell Pottinger's executives were caught on tape boasting about their unique “dark arts” ability to initiate political social change through their deep infiltration into the highest levels of the UK government.
Years later, in a October 2016 report entitled “Fake News and False Flags” the Bureau of Investigative Journalism discovered that BPPA worked in Iraq, devoted to manufacturing pro-Coalition media.
BPPA claimed to specialize in “understanding and influencing the human and social dynamics of conflict and cooperation…using…people’s identities, interests, networks and narratives that are the focal point for communications designed to deliver measurable change in support of political, social, developmental or military objectives.”
In 2005 Slate published an article detailing a hypothetical pandemic out break where the government enlists a propaganda firm to calm the public. That firm was none other than SCL, who made a public debut occupying prime real estate at Defense Systems & Equipment International, or DSEi, the United Kingdom's largest showcase for military technology. So the company first became into public existence around 2005, while SCL already existed.
"The government faces a dilemma: It needs people to stay home, but if the news breaks, mass panic might ensue as people flee the city, carrying the virus with them.
A shadowy media firm steps in to help orchestrate a sophisticated campaign of mass deception. Rather than alert the public to the smallpox threat, the company sets up a high-tech "ops center" to convince the public that an accident at a chemical plant threatens London."
Then there is Michael Flynn's connection to Cambridge Analytica, Flynn served as an advisor to SCL Group in its quest for Pentagon contracts the Washington Post reported earlier last year after he resigned from his post as National Security Adviser.
Cambridge Analytica has since suspended its CEO, Alexander Nix who made the shocking comments about manipulating elections.
It's no secret that big data-mining firms have existed for years telemarketers and email spammers have made fortunes through data mining and obtaining public record data. The problem is that as a society we are increasingly allowing companies more access to our private data.
In Facebook's case what is scary isn't that anyone can see your posts or in some cases location if enabled. It's that certain firms like Cambridge Analytica have access to way more than what's public. Instead they dive into the gray line of spying or surveilling Facebook's users to be blunt.
Facebook is used to login to almost every popular website along with Google, the two companies monopolize the internet and therefore hold a monopoly on your user data.
That's incredibly frightening to say the least someone you don't know some admin has access to all that or in this case some employee at Cambridge Analytica.
Some of the data mining tools have already been revealed in a security breach of a partner company AggregateIQ (AIQ), ZDnet reported.
Canadian political data firm called AggregateIQ (AIQ) left a large code repository downloadable online, according to a security researcher UpGuard Director of Cyber Risk Research Chris Vickery, the news agency wrote.
Then there is Nigel Oakes the business partner of Alexander Nix.
Further, insight into Oakes is the fact he once compared SCL's methods to Hitler and Aristotle.
“We use the same techniques as Aristotle and Hitler,” Oakes told an interviewer in 1992. “We appeal to people on an emotional level to get them to agree on a functional level.”
Finally, one of the most shocking items released within the entire scandal is the fact that according to reports, one of Cambridge Analytica's employees was found dead.
In his testimony, Wylie said that CA's elections chief Dan Muresan was found dead in a hotel room in Kenya in 2012 while working with President Uhuru Kenyatta's re-election campaign. Wylie said he'd heard Muresan was murdered and may have been poisoned working on a project in India, he told a British parliamentary select committee.
"Cambridge Analytica was working with Kenyan politicians, but because in a lot of African countries if a deal goes wrong you pay for it," said Wylie, the Daily Mail reports.
"Dan was my predecessor....what I heard was that he was working on some kind of deal of some sort — I'm not sure what," he said. "The deal went sour. People suspected he was poisoned in his hotel room. I also heard that the police had got bribed not to enter the hotel room for 24 hours. That is what I was told — I was not there so I speak to the veracity of it."
Given the practices suggested here, this isn't surprising in the very least. In that case the whistleblower Christopher Wylie should consider contacting the Witness Protection Program as he just leaked further data that indicates Bolton super PAC benefited from the leaked Facebook data.
Campaign finance records show that "The John Bolton Super PAC" paid Cambridge Analytica more than $1.15 million starting in 2014, after the firm reportedly obtained data from 50 million Facebook users without their knowledge. Yes if all this wasn't bizzare enough now John Bolton the war hawk neoThe Times obtained the contract for the work Cambridge Analytica did for Bolton’s PAC, which included “behavioral microtargeting with psychographic messaging.” Cambridge Analytica went on to work for President Trump's campaign.
I highly doubt this article will fully cover the depth of this scandal but it at least gives you a starting point to begin to grasp the entirety of the situation dealing with deep state operations influencing political affairs.
“Alexander Nix has been suspended from a shell company that has no employees and no assets,” Carole Cadwalladr of the Observer said, who authored last weekend’s expose, and others. “If you think this ends here, think again.”
We must ask ourselves questions why are these companies collecting so much data that enable these activities could they opt out of collecting so much information about a person and if not why? What are their motives for holding so much of our personal details within their systems? When it leaves us vulnerable to psychological social engineering analysis attacks by firms like Cambridge Analytica.
For further information on the history or birth of Cambridge Analytica I recommend this highly informative but long drawn out article on medium entitled: "A Special Relationship & the Birth of Cambridge Analytica."
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