
US Secretly Built 'Cuban Twitter' To Stir Unrest - taylorbuley
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SECRET_CUBAN_TWITTER_ABRIDGED?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-04-03-03-43-35
======
morgante
I'm sure this will bring me lots of downvotes, but I actually applaud these
tactics. Helping people in oppressive regimes to communicate freely with each
other is one of the more humanitarian actions the US can take, and this sort
of connectivity is critical in allowing people a degree of freedom even under
totalitarian governments. Truly repressive regimes are out there, and without
foreign interference and investment people might not have any access to
dissenting views.

As an example, look at the recent article from HN about Romania's brutal
dictatorship.[1] VoA helped to play a major role by inspiring hope and
providing alternative viewpoints within an oppressive system.

Efforts like this (bringing internet connectivity and alternative service to
oppressive regimes which filter internet access) are the VoA of our times.

[1]
[http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26838177](http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26838177)

~~~
tomp
Right... as if the US could not do _anything_ else to help Cuba and it's
people. (E.g. abolishing the trade embargo.)

~~~
morgante
There's no reason those options have to be mutually exclusive. Sadly, I doubt
ending the trade embargo would by itself push Cuba to allow free speech and
open dissent.

~~~
tomp
Well, you can't have free speech without media. Cuba first needs some
economical growth, so that people get (physical) access to the internet, TV,
mobile phones... Then we can talk about de-censoring their media. Also, I
heard that they still have rationed food. Free speech is important, but
survival is more important.

------
iamthepieman
I'm really curious about this paragraph:

"...launched shortly after the 2009 arrest in Cuba of American contractor Alan
Gross. He was imprisoned after traveling repeatedly to the country on a
separate, clandestine USAID mission to expand Internet access using sensitive
technology that only governments use."

expand internet access with technology only governments use? Is this just some
shoddy reporting from a writer who doesn't understand technology or something
else?

~~~
sehugg
Allegedly he was carrying technology that made satellite phone calls hard to
geolocate:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Phillip_Gross#Background](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Phillip_Gross#Background)

------
biesnecker
This is such a bizarre story. It doesn't even seem like it was "the US" as
much as it was an overeager and undersupervised team within USAID. It's sad,
too, because USAID does good work in a lot of places around the world, and
that works is undermined if (rightly or wrongly; seemingly rightly in this
case) host governments think that USAID is an arm of the US intelligence
community.

~~~
aylons
I never heard of a work of USAID that does not involve US trying to enforce
his vision of politics in the country. Could you please illuminate me?

~~~
gadders
Yeah, all that crazy freedom and democracy.

~~~
why-el
Can't work out whether you are being sarcastic or not, but the notion of a
free country exporting freedom and democracy is a novel one. A quick survey of
history will tell you that a country A being democratic does not necessarily
mean it will support countries to follow suit. Think England back in the late
1800s: Very liberal by anyone's standards at that time, but follows horrendous
policies overseas.

~~~
gadders
I agree it may be a modern idea, but I don't think you can really judge
current policies on those of countries from 200 years ago.

------
danso
I've been wondering when a government sponsored excursion into twitter
astroturfing would come up...it is trivially easy to build a network of fake
accounts and to have them followed by hundreds of thousands of fake accounts.
As follower count is the main way that people seem to validate accounts, and
Twitter has little incentive to stop puffed up accounts, how hard would it be
during a revolt to fake something atrocious from the revolters' side and have
it endlessly retweeted before anyone realized what happened? And that's just a
brazen op...more subtle, patient intel ops could be even more pervasive.

There really aren't many tools to quickly validate accounts by sight, though
showing account age would be at least one metric that is harder to fake

~~~
Zigurd
> _it is trivially easy to build a network of fake accounts_

And that's available as an off-the-shelf product of defense/intelligence
contractors:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ntrepid](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ntrepid)

------
terio
Oh, the naiveté!

I doubt anybody in their right mind and with enough information about Cuba
could actually think that the Cuban government could be subverted by a social
network. The government controls all communication in Cuba and they listen to
it ... all the time! The minute something smells a little anti-government, it
gets shut down immediately and people go to prison and are made an example on
national TV.

It really does not matter where the money came from to create this network. At
the end the Cuban government controlled it and there was no way it could be
used for subversion. I really doubt that was the original intention of the
project.

The other interesting point is this:

"... the 2009 arrest in Cuba of American contractor Alan Gross. He was
imprisoned after traveling repeatedly to the country on a separate,
clandestine USAID mission to expand Internet access using sensitive technology
that only governments use."

This is a disguised exaggeration. The equipment Alan Gross brought to Cuba was
completely normal (radios, blackberries, routers, etc) with the only alleged
exception of some protection against geo-location for satellite phones.

I have to suspect the article for its bias towards Cuban propaganda.

------
matthewsimon
You could read this as a cautionary tale about the difficulty in launching a
social networking service: Even with $1.6 million cash (earmarked for a
development project in Pakistan) and 500,000 mobile phone subscriber records
(stolen from the incumbent telecom), their free service couldn't reach 5%
market penetration and was shut down when it ran out of money.

~~~
aurumpotest
But it said in the article that they decided to keep penetration under 1% of
the population so as not to arouse suspicion.

Plus, they had a lot more limitations than your average Silicon Valley
startup. (edit: second point)

------
DominikR
That's the reason why countries like Russia and China make it so hard for NGOs
to work within their borders.

I can't blame them for that, why should they allow foreign governments to stir
up protests in their countries?

Is anyone better off in Libya, Syria or Egypt after the so called "Arab
Spring" destabilized these countries?

~~~
blacksmith_tb
The answer there may be "not yet". But Tunisia is an example of a positive
outcome.

~~~
DominikR
> The answer there may be "not yet"

With that argument you could justify almost anything.

Just ask yourself if you'd tolerate a coup in the US initiated by China that
leads to a civil war which lasts 10 years (basically what people are
experiencing in Afghanistan) and kills millions to install a type of
government that China feels is better and more humane than capitalism.

That's basically what the US is doing to other countries on a regular basis.

------
andyl
The US Government strikes yet another blow to undermine the credibility and
trustworthiness of American Internet Industry. Mission Accomplished.

------
jusben1369
I see a bad comedy where they pitch this to "secret VC's" and talk about how
Cuba is simply the "beach head" with plans to expand into Venezuela next.
They're raising now due to an opportunity to take huge share from Twitter in
Turkey and Egypt. (where they've gone viral despite only being in Spanish)

~~~
zrail
Yeah, this could be a bad 10 minute SNL sketch or an amazingly awesome 15
minute "Whitest Kids You Know" sketch.

~~~
CrazedGeek
I think it could just be a copy/paste of this WKUK sketch in particular:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAjrbtzr_NA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAjrbtzr_NA)

------
xenophonf
I am so disappointed. The kinds of outreach and charity provided by USAID
isn't perfect, but the intent behind it was always good. Heck, if anything I'm
really, really proud of the humanitarian work the U.S. government does,
including USAID at State and NIH and CDC at HHS. Overthrowing governments is
completely at odds with humanitarian missions, never mind the fact that the
outcomes (especially in the Americas) for covert U.S. interventions in foreign
governments are _not_ generally positive.

~~~
morgante
> Overthrowing governments is completely at odds with humanitarian missions

Is it? Oppressive regimes can pose a direct threat to human well-being and
sometimes the best thing you can do for people's humanity is to overthrough
said regime.

~~~
moo
Human well-being, along with literacy, are Cuba's strong suit. They send
doctors all over the world, such as during environmental disasters. During the
2010 Haiti earthquake, the U.S. sent troops, weird. But I guess the Haitians
are free to eat mud cakes.
[http://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/jul/29/food.internatio...](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/jul/29/food.internationalaidanddevelopment)

~~~
paulhauggis
why are all of the anti-us comments being up voted and the the reverse down
voted? I feel like the voting system here on hn does nothing but push one
specific agenda/view

~~~
davidw
That (or the opposite) is a sign that this is a political article, and as such
should simply be flagged and removed as off-topic.

------
not_paul_graham
This almost sounds like something that someone would make up.

Why the hell would the US Govt. want so much unrest all over the world?
Haven't they learned from their screw ups in the past [0]? US supported
Egyptian army is doing god knows what in Egypt; the US has been involved in
the two biggest wars in recent memory (Iraq, Afghanistan), and in not-so-
covert operations in countries like Pakistan, Syria and the like. Seriously
what is this obsession with unrest and wars.

[0]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d'%C3%A9tat#U...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d'%C3%A9tat#U.S._role)

~~~
myth_drannon
Strong governments are an obstacle to corporate ambitions of taking over the
resources of the country.

~~~
crusso
That's an unfortunately popular belief, but not the way things happen in the
real world.

In the real world, corporations use and corrupt the facilities of governments
to undermine restrictions on the behaviors they want while supporting
restrictions on newcomers to their markets or against their customers.

Blindly strengthening government without dealing unambiguously with corruption
only strengthens the weapon that these crony capitalists have to use against
their competitors and customers.

------
bowlofpetunias
It never seizes to amaze me that while the US treats Cuba as a hostile nation
it is in conflict with, the rest of the Western world considers Cuba a holiday
destination.

------
cromwellian
I wondering if this story was about North Korea and parachuting in
communication devices and foreign media, if the condemnation would be equal.

------
pearjuice
Little less than a week ago I commented:

"It is no secret that the protests and revolutions in Syria, Egypt, Tunis and
the like were caused by internal fabrications from American soil so they could
use the uproar for settling marionettes and proper satellite states instead of
having to deal with nations which are against America and [its allies]."[0]

I got down voted into oblivion but I didn't really care. I knew I was right.
Hopefully all of you will realize this too, now. You really thought this is a
new tactic? One case like this? Never done before? A "social experiment"?

[0]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7481111](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7481111)

------
puppetmaster3
How long has USA tried to destabilize a neighbor.

And look at Canada, one of their favorite vacation spots.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Ron_Paul...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Ron_Paul#Non-
intervention)

------
tremols
This just sounds like Castro-Chavista propaganda and its worrying that
americans and europeans are starting to buy this crap.

The idea that US government fights against communism and extreme islam is just
an old lie kept alive by both left & right parties and there is enough
evidence of the contrary (ie Allies surrendering eastern europe to the URSS,
US backing up Pol Pot, Saddam Hussein, supporting the coup against the Persian
Shah and Al Qaeda).

So the truth is that communism and extreme islam are psycho-social ideological
weapons designed to bring countries down - not much different than how opium
was used as a weapon by the brittish.

Then Bankers, the weaponry industry, international insurance companies, and
transnationals among other birds of prey enjoy doing juicy billionary
businesses with the talibanized governments anywhere be it africa or latin
america.

